The Post Hunt was an annual

puzzlehunt A puzzle hunt (sometimes рuzzlehunt) is a puzzle game where teams compete to solve a series of puzzles. A puzzle hunt can happen at a particular location, in multiple locations, or via the Internet. In a puzzle hunt, a puzzle is usually not acc ...

Washington, DC ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan ...

. It was co-created by

Miami Herald The ''Miami Herald'' is an American daily newspaper owned by the McClatchy Company and headquartered in Doral, Florida, a List of communities in Miami-Dade County, Florida, city in western Miami-Dade County, Florida, Miami-Dade County and the M ...

columnist

Dave Barry David McAlister Barry (born July 3, 1947) is an American author and columnist who wrote a nationally syndicated humor column for the ''Miami Herald'' from 1983 to 2005. He has also written numerous books of humor and parody, as well as comic ...

, along with

Gene Weingarten Gene Norman Weingarten (born October 2, 1951) is an American journalist, and former syndicated humor columnist for ''The Washington Post.'' He is the only two-time winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Feature Writing. Weingarten is known for bot ...

and

Tom Shroder Tom Shroder (born 1954 in New York City) is a journalist, writer and editor who worked for the ''Washington Post'' for many years. Biography Shroder is the author of ''The Most Famous Writer Who Ever Lived: A True Story of My Family'' (2016) an ...

. The Post Hunt debuted in 2008. The most recent hunt took place on May 22, 2016. The hunt was discontinued in 2017. It was a renamed version of the

Tropic Hunt The Herald Hunt, formerly the Tropic Hunt, is an annual puzzle hunt in Miami, Florida. It was co-created by '' Miami Herald'' columnist Dave Barry, along with ''Tropic'' editors Gene Weingarten and Tom Shroder. The Tropic Hunt debuted in 1984, and ...

, also created by Barry, Weingarten and Shroder, which had a long run in

Miami, FL Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a coastal metropolis and the county seat of Miami-Dade County in South Florida, United States. With a population of 442,241 at the ...

. The

Washington Post Magazine ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...

held a Hunt in downtown Washington DC, attended by about 5,000 people, including dozens who came up from South Florida. In 2015, for the first time in 10 years, Gene Weingarten, now a columnist for the Post Magazine, joined Shroder, now editor of the Post Magazine, and Barry in designing the Hunt.

Format

The Hunt consists of three parts. Answering the "opening questions" directs Hunters to five puzzle sites scattered through the Hunt area. Solving the five Hunt puzzles—the answer is always a number—indicates the five authentic clues on a list of dozens of numbered bogus clues. Hunters have three hours to solve the puzzles, then at 3 p.m., a sixth and final clue is announced from the main stage. This begins the "endgame", which is by far the most difficult puzzle of the day. Solving the endgame often leads to a

phone number A telephone number is a sequence of digits assigned to a landline telephone subscriber station connected to a telephone line or to a wireless electronic telephony device, such as a radio telephone or a mobile telephone, or to other devices f ...

, or directs Hunters to go to a certain out-of-the-way location and give a

password A password, sometimes called a passcode (for example in Apple devices), is secret data, typically a string of characters, usually used to confirm a user's identity. Traditionally, passwords were expected to be memorized, but the large number of ...

to someone identified in a cryptic way.

Previous Winners

The winners of the 2016 Washington Post hunt were Benjamin McRae, Erin McRae, Mark Swiatek, and Michael Engard The winners of the 2015 Washington Post hunt were Todd Etter, Chris Guthrie, Matthew Hartman, and Charlie Scarborough The winners of the 2014 Washington Post Hunt were Todd Etter, David Forrest, Chris Guthrie, and Charlie Scarborough The winner of the 2013 Washington Post Hunt was solo participant Sean Memon The winners of the 2012 Washington Post Hunt were: Phil Spector, 35, of Washington; Sabita Soneji, 35, of Washington; John Mackedon, 34, of Washington; Mark Cackler, 57, of Falls Church; Timothy Bouley, 31, of Washington; Madalina Cristoloveanu, 31, of Washington; Kris White, 29, of Washington; Sean Sharifi, 30, of Vienna; Nicole Mechem, 32, of Washington; Damon Taaffe, 35, of Arlington; Alva Kretschmer, 27, of Washington; Patricia Van de Velde, 27, of Washington The winners of the 2011 Washington Post Hunt were Sean and Diana Viera, Alex Elliott, Kevin Chang, James Auwaerter, Amy Posten and Galen Mullins The winners of the 2010 Washington Post Hunt were John Sanders, Eana Chung, Eric Pilar, Chris Wong, Suzanne Schwartz, Joe Grossman and Katie Elder The winners of the 2009 Washington Post Hunt were David Shahoulian, Emma Filstrup, Serena Hoy, Jim Reilly, Jenny Hunter, and Tom Jawetz The winners of the 2008 Washington Post Hunt were Todd Etter, David Forrest, Chris Guthrie, and Jack Reda

References

{{reflist

External links

Official site

The Tropic/Herald Hunt Archives
Puzzle hunts