Elementary My Dear Watson

So over the last week, any dreams I had about being the next Sherlock Holmes were crushed in one hour of clue finding and problem solving…apparently reading Sir Arthur Conan Doyle religiously when I was younger and watching Benedict Cumberbatch do his thing on the BBC didn’t turn me into the epic deductive problem solver I thought it would. If I am honest with you, I don’t think I could even pull off being Watson.

Context? – This cool experience called Hint Hunt. Basically you are locked in a room for an hour with the aim of finding clues and solving puzzles to solve a murder and get out of the room. You have to figure out codes, find keys, look for clues and they are hidden everywhere – and I mean everywhere, though don’t worry I won’t give anything away in case you want to go and give it a try. 

The maximum number of people who can be in the room is 5, and you are fully briefed by the organisers on the layout of the room and the need to be very thorough on your clue searching, looking everywhere at least 5 times. I don’t think we looked at everything 5 times though – so maybe that’s where we went wrong. Anyway give it a go, the one I went to was in London, but they have them everywhere.

So after attempting to be Sherlock Holmes and failing on a miserable level, I decided I would go ahead and see what this guy was all about? How? Elementary my dear Watson – head over to the Museum of London where they are currently doing a Sherlock Holmes exhibition on all things Sherlock (though it ends on the 12^th April so hurry)

The exhibition - in a word is amazing - if you have the chance got and see it, its well worth the £12 entry. First of all you enter through a bookcase - yep a bookcase - how cool is that? You then get led through the movie posters and cultural impact the story has had on the world. After that bit is our of the way and done with then comes the really cool stuff (bear in mind that I am a literature geek) i.e the manuscripts of Arthur Conan Doyle's early Sherlock stories, and alongside it an interview with the man himself. I don't want to spoil too much here but if you were ever wondering who Sherlock Holmes, Moriarty and Watson were based on - then this is the place to find out. In addition to this the exhibition takes you through what London would have been like in Sherlock's day with maps, paintings and the modern day take on transport. As you may have picked up on from previous blogs - I am not a huge museum fan but I spent a good few hours here!

Yes Ladies and Gentlemen - This is THE coat worn by Cumberbatch in the BBC Series! 

Maybe one day I will turn into the detective extraordinaire, but until then I think I will just stick with my Benedict Cumberbatch sessions – I mean there could be worse things to do right?

x
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