A Life of Adventure

Glady Reign asked:


Volvo Car Corporation calls all pirates, scallywags and treasure fanatics to join The Hunt!, a competition is in connection with the movie Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End which opens in theatres on May 25. The company earlier announced the online search for a sunken treasure chest containing $50,000 in gold pieces and the keys to a new Volvo XC90 luxury SUV will begin May 4 and the company is challenging Canadians and registrants from 21 other countries to find it.

The online hunt is the second in Volvo’s partnership with Disney’s Pirates of the Caribbean movie franchise and it’s the first time the competition has been open to Canadians. Last year’s program was limited to residents of the United States, United Kingdom, Japan, Spain and Austria. In addition to the US, Austria, Bulgaria, Canada, Germany, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, Norway, Philippines, Poland, Romania, Russia, Singapore, Sweden, Taiwan, Thailand and the United Kingdom are participating in The Hunt.

To join Volvo’s The Hunt, participants 18 years of age and older must visit a Volvo retailer to pick up a special pirate chart and register at www.volvocanada.com/thehunt any time between May 4 and May 29. Once registered, participants set sail on a virtual high seas adventure and receive clues as they solve a series of challenging and fun online puzzles. People can join The Hunt at any time through May 29, and can catch up with other participants if they correctly answer the puzzles posted online. As the contest progresses, the puzzles will become increasingly harder to solve.

On June 2, the first person from each of the 22 participating countries to finish the online hunt will compete against one another in one final online challenge. To participate in the global head to head, players will be required to present an original pirate chart upon conclusion of The Hunt. Winners will only be eligible if they can produce the pirate chart.

The first of those 22 individuals to solve the final puzzle will be named the winner and will receive a trip to the burial location to retrieve the chest filled with $50,000 in pirate gold and a key to a brand new Volvo XC90.

“Last summer, we held a treasure hunt to find a buried Volvo XC90 V8 to tie in with Disney’s Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest and were blown away by the success – more than 100,000 participants from around the world joined in,” said Linda Gangeri, national advertising manager for Volvo Cars of North America. “This year, with more countries, more booty and all the early interest, we’re really excited to set sail.’ So, come join The Hunt!”

The Volvo brand has already established a reputation for comfort, safety and longevity. And such qualities are imbibed in the XC90, a mid-size luxury crossover SUV. It is based on the Volvo P2 platform, shared with the S80 and other larger Volvos. For this model year, the XC90 was updated to cover refined parts accessories like the Volvo fog light, subtly-restyled front and rear, and a more comfy interior.

According to Russ Rader, spokesman for the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, US study showed that Volvo’s safety has been slipping. Additionally, Finland’s Safety Technology Authority (TUKES) stressed that of Volvo 440 and 460’s structure manufactured between 1993 and 1995 had caused several cases of flare-ups during refueling. Dan Johnston, Volvo’s spokesman, denied that the company’s vehicles are any less safe than the Institute’s top-rated vehicles. He said, “It’s just a philosophy on safety that is different from building cars to pass these kinds of tests.”

In a review, Edmunds.com stated, “The XC90 is well-stocked with standard features. Among them are dual-zone climate control, a power driver seat, steering wheel-mounted stereo controls, one-touch up and down front windows and a roof rack (cross bars are optional).” However, it added, “While around-town driving poses few problems, we found the engine tended to get out of breath while climbing grades, even though altitude doesn’t affect for turbocharged motors nearly as much as naturally-aspirated ones.”

What reviewers liked most about the vehicle is the fact that “ride motions are tidily controlled, the ZF rack-and-pinion steering reacts and reads back faithfully, and the chassis feels stable and predictable.”

But the best one liner about the XC90 was uttered by the Car and Driver. It said, “When a car company whose name means ‘I roll’ in Latin plans a foray into the world of sport-utility vehicles, you can bet there’s some serious review of the issues.” AutoWeek further noted, “Like gazillions of soccer moms nationwide, we’ve succumbed to crossoveritis. So much so we’ve added Volvo’s new upmarket SUV, the XC90, to the AutoWeek long-term fleet”

Sam Scribbler asked:


 

I am a treasure hunter. I don’t mean that I leave the house each morning armed with a pick and a shovel and an old map marked with an X. No. My tools are the Antique Trade Gazette’s auction guide, my old motor and forty-years accumulated knowledge of art and antiques. I travel the world looking for mistakes made by auction houses and dealers wherever I can find them. I eat most days, but I’m not getting rich.

 

Picture restorer, dealer, Mike Cunningham was one of the greatest treasures I ever found. We clicked from the moment we met and I was sure we would grow old together. When he died in his sleep in 2000 I was more upset than when I lost my Dad. Mike was fifty-two years old, fit and full of plans for the future. He had recently decided to sell his London home and retire to Hastings, on the south coast of England, where he and partner Sue already owned a small house in the Old Town. Mike and I had bought many pictures together over the preceding twenty years, most of them turned over quickly for a profit. But when Mike died we were still half shares in a painting that, if we had some provenance, would have secured our futures and that of a small African nation.

 

Mike bought the picture from some Irish travellers on the Goldbourne Road (off Portobello Road, London) one, very wet, Friday morning in 1980. He paid two pounds ($4.00). He didn’t even know that it was a painting. All he could see in the half-light was a muddy, cupboard door, burned on one side with traces of paint on the charcoal. The other side had old wallpaper stuck to it and a letter attached to the top right-hand corner. He did think the letter looked interesting – although he couldn’t speak French – and he thought he recognised the signature. Later, back at his studio in Fulham he wiped the mud from the charcoal and discovered Picasso’s Guernica – in colour http://www.yopicasso.com.

 

The painting measures 45.5cm x 57.5cm is signed Picasso 1937 in the body of the fallen warrior. The letter on the back was addressed to Gordon Davy of the R.A.E. Cap D’Antibes 2.1.46 and signed Picasso and a footnote – Operation Special Executive Project Design – Guernica. The top left-hand corner of this letter (with “Pour Gordon” written on it) was detached and lost, but a Photograph does exist.

 

In July 1981 Mike showed the picture to Roland Penrose. Penrose liked the picture. He said that he had never seen it himself, but he promised he would make some inquiries. Unfortunately Mr Penrose died, before Mike was able to enter into correspondence with him.

 

It took me a couple of years to persuade him, but, in a moment of weakness, Mike eventually sold me a half share. In 1987 we approached a handwriting expert at New Scotland Yard and asked her to take a look at the letter. Encouragingly she saw no reason to suppose the letter was a fake, although, due to the lack of suitable reference for comparison, she was unable to give a definitive judgment. The hunt began for samples of Picasso’s writing from around the same date, written with a brush and, preferably, written while he was in a similar frame of mind.

 

I had the brilliant idea that we should write to the Picasso committee in Paris and ask for help. This, of course, was a disaster. The committee simply condemned the picture. They had no reference for it and we had no history.

 

We did find some suitable examples of handwriting over the next few years and in 1990 the expert wrote to us saying that: “There are some fairly good matches between the writings but I keep coming back to the letter ‘d’ ” – she was unable to find a match for this letter in the same form. She continued to be encouraging and suggested that we keep searching for painted handwriting.

 

I suppose we did make some effort to find more reference, but not a lot. We were always busy with other things. Mike made a very nice box for the painting and for the next ten years it rarely saw the light of day. I haven’t seen it since the year before Mike died. I don’t even know where it is. I miss my friend a lot more than I miss the painting – I’d rather hear Mike’s voice on the end of the phone with a cheery – “‘ello, mate. You ‘eard the one about the bow-legged vicar and the policewoman?” – than ever have a provenance for a painting – even Picasso’s Guernica in colour.