Treasure Hunters is a reality television series on NBC (US) and Global (Canada) in which ten teams of three solve puzzles and complete challenges in hopes of solving the ultimate puzzle and winning the grand prize. Teams travel across the United States and Europe in search of seven "artifacts" which when assembled will "lead to the key. Find the key, and find the treasure." The challenges and puzzles are spliced with American history, and the ultimate goal is to find a hidden treasure, leading the show to be compared on various occasions to the film National Treasure. The value of the treasure in the series was revealed on the season finale to be $3,000,000.
The two-hour premiere episode aired on June 18, 2006 and beginning June 26 the series moved to its regular Monday night timeslot. The season finale was broadcast live on August 21, 2006.
The Hunt is similar in format to The Amazing Race. Key differences include:
Teams consist of three members as opposed to The Amazing Races usual two The start location of each leg is not necessarily the end point of the previous leg Teams start each leg at the same time; Amazing Race teams have staggered starts based on previous leg finish order Amazing Race teams may take no electronic devices with them; Treasure Hunters teams are provided several pieces of electronic equipment, including: a Motorola RAZR cell phone, by which they receive messages and information from host Laird Macintosh; additional phones they may use to call other teams and each other; a laptop computer with "special access" to Ask.com and Orbitz.com; a Garmin GPSMAP 60C GPS unit The show focuses more closely on the solving of clues and tasks, which are much more difficult and cryptic than in The Amazing Race; The Amazing Race uses comparatively simple clues, and focuses more closely on the interpersonal relationships within the teams. Clues sometimes offer multiple solution methods, and false solutions are incorporated into them.
Teams and rankings
Team name Members Leg 1‡ Leg 2 Leg 3 Leg 4‡ Leg 5 Leg 6 Leg 7 Leg 8‡Result Team Geniuses Charles Taylor, 22, StudentFrancis Goldshmid, 19, StudentSam Khurana, 21, Student9th 6th 1st 6th 4th 2nd 3rd 1st Winner Team Air Force Brooke Rillos, 27, Air Force OfficerMatt Rillos, 26, Air Force CaptainMatt Zitzlsperger, 26, Air Force Officer1st 1st 6th 1st 5th 1st 1st 2nd§ Eliminated (Leg 8) Team Southie Boys John Collins, 32, Mortgage BrokerMatthew Mullen, 36, FirefighterMartin Mullen, 36, Firefighter2nd 3rd 4th 3rd 3rd 4th 2nd 3rd§ Eliminated (Leg 8) Team Ex-CIA Jacob Porter, 33, ConsultantMark West, 35, Financial AnalystTodd Moore, 32, Software Architect5th 4th 3rd 2nd 2nd 3rd4th Eliminated (Leg 7) Team Miss USA Melissa Witek, 25, Miss Florida USAKaitlyn Christopher, 20, Miss Indiana USAKristen Johnson, 24, Miss Kentucky USA3rd 5th 2nd 5th 1st 5th Eliminated (Leg 6) Team Fogal Family Margie Fogal, 47, Student Service TechnicianKayte Andersen, 25, TeacherBrad Fogal, 48, Pastor4th 2nd 5th 4th 6th Eliminated (Leg 5) Team Brown Family Keith Brown, 42, TelecommunicationsTonny Brown, 37, Admin AsstTerrance Brown, 39, Office Depot7th 9th+ 7th 7th Eliminated (Leg 4) Team Wild Hanlons Josh Hanlon, 19, StudentPatrick (Pat) Hanlon, 38, Small Business OwnerBen Hanlon, 49, Entrepreneur8th 8th 8th Eliminated (Leg 3) Team Grad Students Jessica Schilling, 26, BartenderMelissa Schilling, 26, BartenderKathleen Krapfl, 26, Bartender6th 7th+ Withdrew due to injury (Leg 2) Team Young Professionals Taryn Brown, 28, Law StudentDrew Brown, 25, Med StudentChandra Lewis, 25, Public Relations10th Eliminated (Leg 1) A red placement indicates the team was eliminated. A dark red placement indicates the team withdrew for medical reasons. An underlined blue indicates the team was initially eliminated, but was allowed to return due to unforeseen circumstances. +Team Grad Students dropped out after Leg 2 because of injury; Team Brown Family was brought back to replace them. §Teams Air Force and Southie Boys were both eliminated at the same time at the end of Leg 8 once Team Geniuses found the treasure. ‡Leg was shown over two episodes.
The Hunt
Leg 1 (Alaska/Hawaii → Nebraska → South Dakota) Ten teams started the hunt split into two groups of five, with each group of teams unaware of the other's existence. Five teams started at the Independence Mining Camp in Alaska and the other five started aboard a ship identified as the U.S.S. Jefferson (although the US Navy currently has no ship by that name), off the coast of Hawaii. The first clue for both sets was in the form of a Morse Code message which teams had to decipher. Although none of the teams knew Morse Code offhand, there were guidebooks scattered around the locations.
The Alaska teams headed to Matanuska Glacier where they had to locate a block of ice. The words "Stillwater Washington" were etched on each block, and a map with various destinations was contained inside it, along with the word "dig." Teams had to figure out where to go next by associating the etched clue with a place on the map (the answer was Lake George, Alaska), and tell that location to one of the five awaiting helicopter pilots before they could commence. At Lake George, teams had to dig for a cylinder and a clue directing them to the capitol building in Lincoln, Nebraska.
The Hawaii teams were led by their Morse Code clue to a dive site (Hāna Bay) where they had to locate a metal box containing a pilot's log with the coordinates of the next location, Black Sand Beach. There, the teams had to look for the Monticello crash site, where they had to find a locked box among plane wreckage. A key concealed within a Jeffersonian cane would open the box, but it would not work until assembled along with the handle segment of the cane. Inside the box was a coded map, with a painting on the reverse, and teams received a message to head to Lincoln.
When teams reached Lincoln, they learned that there were not five but ten teams. Each team was paired with one from the other starting point based on their order of arrival in Lincoln. Each pair of teams boarded a bus, which headed away from their next destination. By combining the cylinder found in Alaska (which had a cipher alphabet engraved on it) and the coded map found in Hawaii, teams had to determine their next destination and relay this information to their driver. The decoded message, "Mount Theodore Roosevelt," could be interpreted in two ways: literally, leading to the incorrect location of Mount Theodore Roosevelt, South Dakota; or along with a clue given in a message to consider where the teams have been - Lake George (Washington), USS Jefferson, Lincoln, Nebraska - along with Mount Theodore Roosevelt together point to the four presidents carved on Mount Rushmore, the correct destination. Unbeknownst to – and undiscovered by – the teams, if they had put the two clues together in a different way (by placing the cylinder in the middle of the painting on the back of the map), an image of Mount Rushmore would have been revealed. All teams deduced or guessed the correct destination except for the Young Professionals/Geniuses. After a fruitless search at Mount Roosevelt eventually the Young Professionals/Geniuses called the Wild Hanlons, who gave away the correct destination.
At Mount Rushmore, the teams, no longer working in two-team pairings, had to find a spot on the Presidential Trail where only two of the four presidents could be seen and then follow a smaller path until they found locked boxes containing the first of seven "artifacts" necessary to find the treasure. In this instance, the artifact was a map. The boxes opened with a combination. Teams were earlier given a clue message telling them to pay attention to the natural order of things, but that sometimes history has a way of changing it. This clue referred to the fact that the heads are not in the correct presidential order; Roosevelt and Lincoln are reversed. This led to the correct combination of 1-3-2-6-1-6 (each number referring to the order in which the given President – based on their location in Mount Rushmore – was in office). Team Young Professionals and Team Geniuses raced for the last artifact with the Geniuses eventually finding it.
Leg 2 (South Dakota → Montana) Leg 2 was based on the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Beginning at about 2:20 am, teams travelled over 600 mi (965 km), from South Dakota to Lexington Mine in Montana. Teams travelled 10,000 ft (3,050 m) into the mine and searched for the clue, a bucket (which was covered with snakes) inscribed with the words "bend the light." Teams discovered that by filling the bucket with water, the words "Wood Bottom Missouri River Montana" became visible by refraction. Team Southie Boys never found this clue, instead allying with Team Brown Family to leave the Wild Hanlons 11 hours behind them in last place. Teams travelled to the Wood Bottom Recreation Area, from where they would have to canoe in search of the next clue. Canoes could not be in the water after 5:30 pm and no teams arrived at the campsite early enough to launch, so all teams camped there overnight.
The next morning, teams canoed along a 20 mi (32 km) stretch of the Missouri River (including a 3 mi (5 km) portage), following a trail of stars in search of the next clue buried 40 paces behind the fourteenth star. Team Brown Family capsized their canoe, nearly drowning for the second time in as many legs. While portaging, Jessica of Team Grad Students stepped in a hole and injured her ankle. The production team intervened with medical assistance and the team was able to continue with Jessica alternating between crutches and being carried by her teammates. Team Fogal Family misled Teams Ex-CIA and Southie Boys into believing the Fogals were going to stop with them at the 13th star but instead kept paddling after those two teams had docked, which led to contempt for the Fogals (and the expression, "You've been Fogaled!") by the other teams – especially since the Southie Boys had helped the Fogals portage their canoe earlier.
Buried within a fire pit behind the 14th star teams found a table and code key for a double substitution cipher devised by Thomas Jefferson and used by Lewis and Clark, and journal pages describing their next destination, Tower Rock, Montana. At Tower Rock, teams discovered an encrypted sign, which when deciphered read "Follow close and to the right. Look 'neath a rock as dark as night." This led teams to the second artifact, a compass, hidden under black rocks.
The Wild Hanlons spent four hours trying to decipher the clue before Ben decided that they would go get some food. After making an estimated 80 mi (130 km) round trip to a Burger King restaurant, Josh quickly deciphered the message and they were able to find the artifact ahead of Team Brown Family.
Leg 3 (Massachusetts) Leg 3 of the Hunt focused on the American Revolution and started from a bed and breakfast in Boston. It is not explained how the teams travelled from Montana to Boston. Prior to the leg, Team Grad Students bid a tearful farewell to the other teams, having been forced to withdraw because of Jessica's injury on the previous leg. Team Brown Family was brought back in their place, to the consternation of Team Wild Hanlons.