The Escape Room

Have you heard of escape rooms?  It's a new trend that I only heard of 5 or 6 months ago.  My sister suggested that we should try one as a family.  We selected one in American Fork, and it turned out to be a lot of fun.

I made Robyn stand next to the sign before we went in.

So here's how it works.  They lock you in a room.  (In this particular one, the room happened to actually be a trailer in the parking lot of the One Man Band restaurant.)  They set a timer, and you have a limited amount of time to get out.  In this case, the timer was 45 minutes.  I imagine that's fairly standard, but I'm sure it could vary.  When the time runs out, if you haven't gotten out, they let you out and you lose.  But, I preferred to pretend that if you don't make it out, you die.  I felt like that was a little bit more motivating.  Spoiler: We survived.

As we initially looked around the room, there were lots of things to explore.  There were a number of boxes with combination locks, there was an exercise bike, there were locked cupboards and various other mysterious objects.

As you explore, you discover that there are different puzzles that, when solved, reveal clues to solving other puzzles.  Many of the puzzles, when solved, reveal a combination for a lock, then you have to find the lock that it goes with.

 It was super fun to work as a family and solve the puzzles together.  Here are a few pictures from our adventure as a family.

Mom solved a maze puzzle to acquire this key.

It took us a while to figure out what the books were trying to reveal.

Robyn is having things revealed to her in the box.

Those pesky books.

Padre may have broken off a piece of the cupboard while he was trying to figure out a clue.  Don't tell anyone.

This particular box had a locked box inside of it, so it was extra tricky.

 We cut it a little close.  We got out of the room with 3:22 left.  When you open the door, the time stops, so naturally Robyn and I had to take a selfie with the clock.

And here's the whole team.  We totally got out alive.

I totally recommend it.  The puzzles are challenging enough that you get to feel smart when you solve them, but it's all very doable for a group to achieve together.  It also allows you to work as a team and have fun together.

You totally need to give it a try.  And let me know how you do.

Next time we need to try one where a bomb explodes and you die if you don't solve it.  I bet we could do it even faster with proper motivation.