Voyages Extraordinaires – Part I
Captain’s Quest
Captains Quest by Jesse Born
As legend has it, in 1839, at the age when most wizards discover their true nature, young Jules Verne secrets himself as a cabin boy aboard the triple-masted ship Coralie about to set sail for the Indies. His father intercepts the ship before it embarks on the journey, and young Verne is tasked with traveling instead in his imagination.
In 1866 (so the story goes) nations around the globe begin sighting a mysterious sea monster. Naturally an expedition of brave heroes is assembled by the US government to find and slaughter the beast. They are joined at the last moment by French marine biologist Professor Pierre Aronnax. Many months of searching culminate in locating the beast off the coast of Japan. The explorers attack, but are defeated, and tossed into the sea. They only survive, mysteriously, by clinging tightly to the beast itself! Lo and behold, the sea monster is actually a futuristic submarine, the Nautilus, with charismatic madman / genius Captain Nemo at the helm. Nemo, his crew, and their new companions, travel the depths and breadth of the oceans on extraordinary adventures, which include battling a giant squid, and revenging Nemo’s murdered family, until the Nautilus is entrapped by the Maelstrom, a deadly whirlpool, and the stowaways manage to escape while the Nautilus suffers an unknown fate.
Anything you can imagine, you can make real – Jules Verne
A year ago, more or less, another imaginative fellow began devising plans for a new creation. Jesse Born had already collaborated with his friend, the talented metalworker Luke Marshall, on the Sea Chest, and suggested they create an entire box together, with Luke doing the metalwork and Jesse doing the woodwork. They immediately began coming up with different ideas based around a central inspiration – the Captain Nemo stories. Jesse loved to watch Mysterious Island and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea “quite a bit when I was younger”. Jesse envisioned a type of sea monster / angler fish, Luke imagined a more traditional box on pedestal design, and while these and other ideas were exciting, they were all filed away. Next they dove deep into the Nemo lore, designing a puzzle that would hold the captain’s log, or blueprints for the Nautilus, filled with retro futuristic mechanisms and elements from the stories, in what sounds like it will be, someday, a truly epic undertaking. Ever the pragmatists, however, Jesse and Luke decided that a more reasonable approach would be prudent for their first collaborative box together, in order to actually produce something successfully. “At some point we took a step back and we looked at some of the different stuff we had going and [thought] do we really want to spend forever getting this box out [or] let's go with something simpler that we know can have a shorter iteration run to a finished product so that we can get it out there and people can review it rather than have a really long hard uphill battle for the first puzzle box that we collaborated on.”
The Nautilus was piercing the water with its sharp spur, after having accomplished nearly ten thousand leagues in three months and a half, a distance greater than the great circle of the earth. Where were we going now, and what was reserved for the future? – Jules Verne, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, 1872
They settled on a reasonable new idea based around a central mechanism, which became the Captain’s Quest. Of course, with Jesse Born, “settled on” is never quite what it might normally imply, and one look at their new creation reveals it to be a gorgeous, high end product with exquisite details and fine touches, crafted from Ipe wood with steel, brass and copper accents. Jesse’s team also includes his brother-in-law Josh, who helped refine the design. “We built the [prototype] box pretty big and then Josh really is a pusher of having a small footprint (but a lot of compartments for that footprint) so he smushed it a little bit and added a couple compartments which really helped the box. So yeah it was Josh, Luke and I designing the puzzle. Luke is a real stickler for, you know kind of an art nut when it comes to metalworking or cars and different things. He has a refined taste so he helped with some of the coral on the front and the metal work design on the back of the box. He oversaw that … so that was nice.”
Aside from shrinking things into a pleasing size and form factor, the design went smoothly, worked as intended and nothing was left out. “At the same time I realized that in order to make it economical and something that comes out within a few months after we design it and something that we can build, you have to make some sacrifices. Luke’s pretty good at pointing out what's essential, what the solver really needs, and what's just kind of “my vision” that’s not always as practical. That's always a really hard place to be, because to be a great designer I think sometimes you have to go against the grain and do whatever is not practical in order to see your vision through, and to push the boundaries and bring people something new.”
In the end, they focused on ensuring that the central mechanism worked well, and that the aesthetic of the box and theme were consistent, so it appears as a credible object one might have actually found on Nemo’s desk inside the Nautilus. Smaller details, like carvings, or structural ideas, which would have made the box much more difficult to produce, were sometimes left out. Jesse is thoughtful about these little compromises, acknowledging that it can be hard to gauge where to draw the line from cool factor to cost factor. He also needed to work with Luke and the constraints of the metalwork.
The sea is only the embodiment of a supernatural and wonderful existence. – Jules Verne
The boxes are made with a 3D printed shell and lots of different off-the-shelf components that go inside. There are also wood components which are milled on the CNC, and a few brass parts that Josh turns on the lathe. Laser cut wood veneer is added onto the exterior, which is then finished with a sunburst pattern done in tinted lacquer. Luke welds steel plates onto the box to create four sides, Jesse adds more CNC work for the top piece which is then bolted on and Luke finally puts the finish on all the metalwork. They used a water jet to carve the steel (“my laser is not even close to powerful enough to cut out the steel”). Interesting aspects to the build are getting the 3D printed laser cut and water jet metal cut parts to align properly, plus the inherent uncertainty of welding, all of which challenge Jesse’s passion for creating an efficient production process.
Jesse embraces technology to help him achieve his vision in a way that would make Captain Nemo proud, right down to the very name of the puzzle. For Captain’s Quest, he harnessed the creativity of chat GPT, tasking it with name suggestions over and over until he landed on the final selection. “It kept spitting them out and some of them were just hilarious. “Rubber Ducky” found its way into the answer twice, but anyways yeah chat GPT for the name worked really well.”
In presence of Nature's grand convulsions, man is powerless. – Jules Verne
Captain’s Quest has only just started to roll off the production line, but Jesse already has another “Nemo Box” in mind, including the name, central mechanism and at least one essential component – a key. Nemo is a fascinating character, after all, and a great source for puzzles boxes, so it looks like there will be a sequel. Dare I mention it, but even the sequel will not include the “pinnacle” of Jesse’s vision for a Nemo box, with all the mind-blowing effects he first came up with for the theme, so indeed, CQ is possibly the first in a trilogy. Jesse Born is incredibly ambitious with his ideas, and has now implemented a third “line” in his puzzle box catalogue. He is currently overseeing production of the “3D printed” line with Ben Oxenford which began with Lost Vault, now also the “metal” line with Luke Marshall starting with Captain’s Quest, and continues work on his own “wood” line which is currently wrapping up the Sundial. He sees this as a way that “people can expect a little different flavor with each designer or builder, and we can cater to different people, [who] can be selective when buying my work. I'm interested in the feedback, good or bad, because hey if people just don't like it [they] can tell me, and we can pivot.” Love it or hate it, once you hold a Captain’s Quest in your hands you can’t help but be impressed with the effort and quality. It arrives with a mysterious letter which explains very little but makes mention of a Prince Dakkar from the 1850’s. It may well be worth noting that Nemo is actually a pseudonym, derived from the Latin for “no one” or “nobody”, and referencing the original Greek word meaning the same. Nemo was hardly the first to use this ploy. In the Odyssey, when the hero Odysseus encounters the Cyclops, he famously gives his name as “nobody”, a trick which helped him and his men eventually escape.
The “artifact” is heavy and solid, and truly looks exotic, a realistic steampunk device from another time. The movements are smooth and interesting, with tactile and auditory feedback, which immediately draws you in and peaks curiosity. What is this object, and how does it work? What is it for? So the Quest begins, promising multiple discoveries, objects, secrets, clues - and wonder is Born again. “I know there's going to be 100 people who really like it, who think it's the best puzzle of the year. If it's not more than that, that's okay - we'll just cater to the hundred, and I'll please the other people with my other boxes!”
Whiskey Sea by Itzel Gracian
At the Manor Bar, located in the Rosewood Miramar Beach Hotel in Montecito California, the cocktails read like a good book. This year the innovative bar manager Itzel Gracian has created a drinks program inspired by female writers who feature strong female lead characters in their novels. The next chapter in the bar’s literary series, “Chronicles of the Cocktail: Volume II”, features drinks referencing novels such as Like Water for Chocolate and Little Women. Gracian comments, “The multifaceted appeal of literature provides such rich material for our flavor-forward menu and this new iteration dedicated to and celebrating women, is our most exciting showcase yet.”
The elegantly appointed Manor Bar, with its polished mahogany paneled walls, shelves full of books, and tasteful art adorning the walls, would not be out of place aboard the Nautilus, and in fact sounds quite like Captain Nemo’s smoking room. Perhaps Gracian will one day create a drink for the brilliant, haunted captain. Until then we can toast his Quest with one of her other novel drinks, which would be a perfect nightcap beneath the ocean. Her Whiskey Sea, inspired by Ann Howard Creel’s eponymous novel, is a brooding reflection on the illegal rum trade, ironically containing no whiskey at all. It is, regardless, delicious, with flavors of banana and chocolate to bring out the natural sweetness in the rum, and might be just the thing to launch you on your own Quest. Onward, to adventure! Cheers!
The Quest begins …
The Whiskey Sea by Itzel Gracian
2 oz aged rum (such as Bacardi 8)
½ oz crème de cacao
½ oz banana liqueur
¾ oz lemon
2 dashes grapefruit bitters
Shake ingredients with ice and strain into a favorite (ship worthy) vessel over a large cube. Recommended garnish is a dehydrated banana chip.
adventure on …