For the final night of MiRaVar 2021 the crews were presented with a little surprise; The stop for the night was planned in a quiet little cove, pretty much off the beaten track as its secluded sandy beach is not easily accessible by road from the land.
The small bay is quite popular during the day, and populated with many dayboats and motorboats at anchor. They usually leave by the late afternoon, which worked out perfectly for us as our fleet was out sailing the whole day and only came in when the day was drawing to an end.
The riddle included an odd sequence and repetition of the boats' names ....
The more savvy quickly started to get the clue and turned to plotting down on the sand the boat hull numbers, as per the stickers handed out at the beginning of the raid ... strictly following the sequence of the boats' names listed in the riddle :
... that yielded the latitude and longitude position of the treasure hideout, which their portable GPS pointed to a small cove next to the small bay where we anchored.
The crews enthusiastically ran to look for the hideout and had to dig out the treasure chest from underneath sand, dried weeds, washed up branches... they came back to the main cove triumphally with the chest in their hands!!
The chest contained a lush and rich treasure: diamonds, gold, precious stones rather in the shape of sweets, chocolate, liquor, a commemorative stone of our rounding of Cap Sycié the year prior (made of real CAp Sycié slate) ... and more importantly the invitation to a future "secret mission":
The pirate left the valiant crews a sealed envelope containing the invitation to a future secret mission! Miravar will infact turn into MIRASAR (Mini Raid Sardinia) for 2022: upon reading the text of the letter left by the pirate, the crews receive their official invitation to a new raid to take place in Sardinia in 2022!
