The golden owl had been buried in April 1993 in a place that had to be identified thanks to 11 puzzles presented in the book On the trace of the golden owl.
The golden owl, a giant treasure hunt solution that fascinated thousands of participants, was found in October in the Mosellan village of Dabo (east of France), the co-inventor of this riddle announced on Friday, 32 years after its launch. Michel Becker, responsible for this treasure hunt, has been cleaning up since the location of the cache was discovered on the night of October 2 to 3, 2024, communicating only in droppings to maintain the interest of “Owls”.
The secret was since kept on the site of the discovery: those who wanted to learn it had to book and pay their place for one of the 500 event sessions of a documentary of 1:10, “The discovery of the golden owl”broadcast only Friday and Saturday. In the film, the name of Dabo is unveiled, the organizers said on Friday evening at AFP. They have already announced the launch of a new season of this treasure hunt.
The game relaunched in 2021
The golden owl had been buried in April 1993 in a place that had to be identified thanks to 11 puzzles presented in the book On the trace of the golden owl. Undergoing the replica made it possible to win the owl, sculpture of ten kilos in precious metals. Its value had been initially estimated at a million francs (150,000 euros).
The creator of the enigma was an author of books on marketing, Régis Hauser, who had taken the pseudonym of Max Valentin and who died in 2009. Michel Becker designed the sculpture, produced by an goldsmith. After a long conflict between Becker and the heirs of Hauser, the game had been relaunched in 2021, with new indices on the Discord social network.
