Honeys, I'm home!
And wow what a wonderful time we had. As a matter of fact, we can't remember having so much fun!
It was just soooo cool. I'll try to explain some of it. And I'll try to be short and sweet. It took us two hours to fill the boys in on our weekend when we got home yesterday.
This resort is in the middle of nowhere in the upper part of the Lower Peninsula of Michigan. (are you guys good on geography? You know we have two parts to Michigan, right?) The resort is not very big, just 3 buildings that kind of look like apartments that held all of the guests' rooms.
The event started on Friday night with a dessert reception in the "Loft". The theme for the weekend was American Idol and we were all invited to the Loft on the premise that it was the American Idol auditions and that we were all 'discovered' along the way and at random would be able to audition. (don't worry girls, the characters were already set and THEY were the ones that were picked at random to do the auditioning. I didn't really have to sing! ) Anyway, we went through the initial "setting of the stage" if you will and as it turned out, one of the judges had been found dead in her room before the auditions.
Our goal for the weekend was to find the murderer(s) for each killing, the accomplice(s), and then list all of the relevant clues that you found to support each of your suspicions. Everything you listed was worth points toward the prize, but if you got the murderer(s) wrong, you didn't get any points for that particular victim.
Once the 'stage was set' we were all set loose on searching the suspects' (read all the contestants and one other judge) rooms. The suspects each had rooms in the resort and they were available in their rooms for each of the teams of sleuths to visit, question, and search their rooms.
So off we went with the team we had been hooked up with and started searching the rooms. (well, we had no clue as to what exactly to do at this point so we searched very superficiously (peaking gingerly behind stuff, lifting a piece of paper here and there). This continued until 11:00 at night. Then our team went back to our room to try and make some sense out of what we had seen and try to be more organized for the next morning.
Saturday morning breakfast was from 7:30 - 8:30 in the morning.
Then up to the Loft to for the story to continue. Once we left there, it was time to search rooms for clues again and when we reached one girl's room, we found that she was now murdered too.
We continued to search rooms until 11:30 when a time out was called so that everyone could get some lunch and regroup. (during this search, we weren't so dainty. We tore sofa cushions off, went in the refrigerator, dug through coolers) We were told that every time there was a new 'searching session' that new clues could appear and that something else might happen. From 3:30-4:15 we had another session before jumping on horse drawn wagons for a wagon ride through an Elk ranch to see the Elk and to arrive at a remote cabin for our gourmet dinner.
The ride was very nice, although very cold. We saw lots of Elk and they stopped the wagons so we could get off and take pictures. We were told alot of great information about Elk and the way the ranch is run, how their antlers grow new every year and fall off every year. It was very educational.
When we got to the cabin, a couple of the staff brought an Elk antler around to each table and let us hold it up. It's amazing. They weigh like 20-30 pounds and you figure an Elk has two of them that he's holding up all the time. I would definately has a constant stiff neck.
We had time outs and time ins for the game throughout dinner. We got to hear a history of how the resort and Elk ranch were started. The whole place is run by a man and his wife, her daughter and the daughter's husband. They are all wonderful people, genuinely interested in their guests having a great time, and educating them besides. It was just GREAT!~
Anyway, back to the game. During dinner there was another murder. We hopped back on the wagons and went back to the resort to search rooms once again. When we got to one of the girl's rooms, she had been murdered at the cabin, last minute before the wagons had left. So now we had 4 murders to solve. The room searches went on until 10:30. (this time there were no holds barred. We tore stoves apart, turned mattresses over, searched in murphy beds. You name it, we tore it apart.)
All night Friday and all day and night Saturday we were taking notes, searching rooms again and again and meeting to compile and compare notes with the team. Then at 10:30 Saturday night the game was over and we had one hour to turn in our sheets with the answers. So we went back to our room with the team and compiled everything we knew (and surmised). Then ran to the Loft to turn the sheet in by 11:30 PM.
Sunday morning, breakfast was between 7:30-8:30 again with the wrap up in the Loft at 9:00.
We really did not think we did all that well. We thought we had 3 murderers correct. We only found 2 of the murder weapons. We weren't sure about accomplices, and we wrote down as many clues as we could think of that we found to support each of our theories.
The wrap up included the introduction of all the characters. And as it turns out, the majority of the characters had all been on the sleuth side of things a couple of times and then volunteered to be characters, and the others were staff and friends.
The wrap up also included the whole story being told. The daughter writes all of the murder mysteries that are done at the resort, so she told the story and made all of the pieces fit together, showing all of the relevant clues and telling where they were all hidden.
Anyway, long story short (I know, too late!); we won 3rd place out of nine teams! WooHoo! We were just thrilled!
The weekend was not what we expected. Although we're not sure what we expected, just that this wasn't it. But we had the grandest time. It was not romantic, there was no quiet time. By the time we finished searching rooms each night it was so late, and we were so blasted tired that we crashed because we had to get up at the crack of dawn to start all over again the next day. But we still had a GREAT time!
Ok, now that I've written a whole page, let's see if I lose it when I hit post. If so, I won't be back, it took too long to write.
I have not had a chance to read what I missed so I hope you will forgive me for not replying to anyone. I will have to catch that up later.
Love
to all.