Welcome to the Farewell to Finder’s Fest geo-art, brought to you by the Forest Minions! This series celebrates weird and unusual things throughout the Sunshine State. Please do not go to the posted locations. Rather, solve the challenging quiz found at the bottom of each page, for the final location. For the letterbox caches, please leave the stamp in the cache. They are not trade items. For the discerning traveler, we’ve included the GPS coordinates for these bizarre locations, when we were able to establish them.
San Pablo Shipwreck – Location 30.1889, -87.2176
In 1944, a 315-foot ship exploded nine miles off the Pensacola shore, startling residents who watched the metal debris disappear beneath the waves. Rumors spread that the ship was related to Soviet espionage, earning the wreck a new nickname: the “Russian Freighter.” Yet, the truth is even stranger. The unlucky cargo ship was actually a crash-test dummy for a top-secret military explosive.
The United States military had been experimenting with remote-controlled speedboats filled with explosives to sink larger ships. The speedboat could be disguised as a civilian fishing boat with fake exhaust smoke and engine sounds to deceive axis harbor defenses. There, it could ram into axis-controlled boats while detonating explosives. The San Pablo was refloated and brought to Pensacola so the military could test its new weapon. A speedboat carrying 3,000 pounds of explosives crashed into the cargo ship, which immediately exploded and sunk.
Here is the super duper, way challenging, really hard trivia question, which, if solved properly, will lead you to the final coordinates:
Question: What country has 158 verses, in its national anthem?
A: Mordor = N29° 28.254' W81° 52.107'
B: Hogwarts = N29° 28.264' W81° 52.107'
C: Greece = N29° 28.274' W81° 52.107'