Michel Becker, the treasure hunt organiser, has announced that the correct solution has been given to him. The longest running treasure hunt in the world* is finally over!

Becker’s first announcement on his Discord server on the morning of 3/10/2024 said, ‘A potential winning solution is currently being verified. The verification system is currently locked and no longer allows you to submit your solutions. Further information will be communicated to you as soon as possible.’

He followed this up with a second message around two hours later.

Don’t go digging!  We confirm that the Golden Owl countermark was unearthed last night, simultaneously with a solution upload to the online verification system. It is therefore useless to go digging on the location you assume to be the cache. As previously announced, we are verifying the validity of the proposed solution.

The chouettedor.com official website confirms the owl was found on October 3rd.

We are promised another update by video some time today (4/10/24) I’ll update this page when it’s come through.

Well done to the finder of the owl, huge congratulations are due. I hope we will learn the finder’s name in due course, and finally find the answers to the clues.

One of the community sites keeps an ongoing tally of the length of this hunt. It’s quite amazing to think that that someone has finally solved this after so many long years!

*Sur La Trace de La Chouette d’Or founded in 1993 is the longest running unsolved treasure hunt with a single prize. The Secret treasure hunt was founded in 1982 but 3 of the 12 prizes have been found.