On Tuesday A great way to explore your home city
IF you happened to see a man with a puzzled look on his face and two children in tow walking around Plymouth lately, I might be able to offer an explanation.
I recently tried out a new type of city tour, in which attractions and history are unravelled in a series of puzzles and challenges – like an escape room, but where the entire city is the backdrop, and your smartphone your personal tour guide.
The Plymouth trail has recently been launched by Go Quest Adventures, a start-up founded by a couple from the Isle of Man and which now covers 23 places across the UK.
A version of the tour for Exeter is planned to be released soon, in case you are interested.
The Plymouth version tells you to start at the Derry’s Clocktower, which sits in a pedestrian nook between the back of Theatre Royal Plymouth and the adjacent multistorey car park.
It was telling that this little piece of history was used as the starting point, as the clocktower was once at the centre of an important civic area of Plymouth and has been rather forgotten in the scramble to rebuild the city anew in the aftermath of the Blitz.
The first clue has us working out a puzzle based on counting pavement slabs and finding a specified one of the many ‘stars’ which are embedded into the pavement outside the theatre. The surname on the star is the answer that we need to be given the next clue. And so it goes on.
We wandered along Royal Parade, turned towards the Hoe past Citadel Road, and then down towards the Barbican, solving puzzles along the way. There are 17 answers to find, and as many different puzzles to unlock, and the children were as engaged in the process as I was.
The tour includes sections of text explaining some of the city’s historic highlights, from Sir Francis Drake and the embarkation from the Mayflower Steps, all the the way to the Second World War.
There are hints in case you get really stumped, or you can bypass the question altogether if you prefer, although you lose points off your total if you do this.
By the end, your points from each answer is combined with your time, and you get an overall score on the leaderboard.
Although it is tempting to rush around the whole thing, it is designed to take between two and three hours, and so it is worth taking the time to enjoy it as you go along – plus there is the chance to pause the trail once, so you can break for lunch or coffee – or, in our case, an ice cream sitting on the Hoe looking out over the water.
Having lived back in Plymouth for more than 20 years, some of the answers came easier than if I was a newcomer to the city, but there are enough clues around that, if you had never set foot on the Hoe before, you could still find the answers.
And it was a great way of finding out a bit more about areas of the city’s history which I was perhaps not so hot on – and a good chance for the children to learn, too.
Although it is a great family idea, the toughness of the challenge means that children under 10 might struggle to take part in a meaningful way, which is worth considering.
It is also worth following the advice about what to bring with you, which includes a full charge for your smartphone.
Having realised some way along the Barbican that my phone battery was flagging, we watched the level go down to 1% as we reached the final question, and were almost running towards the Guildhall when the phone died.
We ended up finishing off the last question from home, phone attached to a charger, but definitely felt somewhat the wiser for it. Good luck if you try it for yourself.
‘Attractions and history are unravelled in a series of puzzles and challenges’