A Holiday That Money Can’t Buy
‘The thought, inspiration and creativity involved in organising our week made our holiday the most memorable and enjoyable celebration we have ever had, Thank You.’
The Happy Couple Ian and Sue Packer
The London Quest Company set out to make Ian’s 60th Birthday an occasion never to forget. With the help of a close friend we constructed a birthday present of a holiday that he and his wife would relish for the rest of their years.
To understand the Quest we must first tell you about Ian.
Ian is a Geographer, he loves foreign climbs and has travelled to as many different countries as he has years! Not only does he enjoy foreign countries, he also has a love for their culture, their buildings and the fabrics of these buildings that hide a thousand stories.
His favourite form of architecture is found in buildings with ecclesiastical heritage. He loves the way in which the churches’ architecture represents the spirituality of the building. How the design is functional, ornate and specific for its purpose.
The Quest:
Ian and Sue were told to keep a week free that worked for them in their busy schedule, three days before this week they received a letter with a set of instructions and two tickets for the Eurostar, they also had a list of things that they had to pack and some emergency numbers for peace of mind.
The train took the couple to Paris, they were about to embark on an adventure that they would never forget. Clues appeared at various points delivered by mysterious characters who placed information in the possession of the couple with varied techniques, through notes in café bills, in their hands from ‘strangers’ passing by and hidden under park benches. The characters had the couple questioning who was in on the adventure and who was just an innocent member of the public.
The information received came in the form of cryptic clues that when solved provided instructions to travel to a new destination. From St Peters Church, to the Saracur, a cemetery on Avenue des Anglais and St Martins in the Field (Paris), the couple toured Paris. As they travelled to the various destinations they located words engraved on the buildings. From these words the couple had to find single letters, they were instructed to note these letters down. The final clue of the day took them to a flat on the Isle de la Cite, where instructions to a restaurant and their dinner lay waiting.
‘It was as if someone was 5 minutes ahead of us at every point leaving a trail that only we would understand.’ Sue Packer
The next day the couple found further clues at the ‘art and craft’ station and learnt the history behind the revolution, all the time noting down their letters. As the day drew to a close they picked up what was to be their final letter. With further instructions they sat down to create a word…
After testing their abilities at solving anagrams they put the word together, ‘Sounion’, as a written word this had little meaning but when spoken out loud it is pronounced ‘Sue n Ian’. Not only does the place represent their names it also happens to be a Temple (religious connotations), in Greece, on a peninsula that would have been the last piece of land that sailors saw as they set off to explore the world. As a Cornish man Ian became excited, only to be overwhelmed as two minutes later two tickets landed in his lap to fly to Greece!
‘Unbelievable and unforgettable!’ Ian Packer
Email us with any query at: questions@londonquest.co.uk Or telephone us on: +44 (0) 20 7202 4802
