Like someone who shows up first to a blind date, you may be hotly anticipating the appearance of the answers to our recent Valentine’s riddles.
And here they are, right on time, with a bouquet of roses for the winners, who’ll each receive a $50 gift card to one of their favorite local restaurants—plus, for companionship’s sake, two copies of our food and drink passport, The Chaser. We’re also giving a pair of Chasers to the only person who solved all seven riddles, including the ones that played especially hard to get.
The first riddle, “Lovers star-crossed can cross them here, assuming it’s Tuesday and skies are clear,” wasn’t one of them. Nearly four in five respondents saw in its constellation of letters Yale’s Leitner Observatory, where, on clear Tuesday evenings during the academic year, the public can use provided telescopes to gaze into the stars.
The second riddle, “Drinking on V-Day in bars alone? The vino list here is más largo, you know,” proved only slightly more difficult. The answer, of course, has to be a Spanish-influenced bar with a famously long wine list, which, like the suggestive phrasing “bars alone,” points right to Barcelona.
Riddle #3 was, like love, a mystery: “Where once lovers’ gifts were smithed and sold, love-building for buildings is now the goal.” Respondents had various theories, but only one of them, reached by fewer than 15% of solvers, satisfied: the New Haven Preservation Trust. NHPT conducts its mission to “rally our diverse city to embrace and champion” its “architectural heritage,” i.e. build love for buildings, from offices at 922 State Street, which long housed the Zernitz family and their jewelry business.
In a recovery, nearly three in five respondents solved riddle #4: “Parked in a place that’s both inside and out-, steamy self-care’s what this popup’s about.” Most people knew the solution must be a popup sauna. But which one? Of two possibilities, DRYYP and Steam City, only one is “parked,” and in a park no less: DRYYP, whose CITA Park digs are “both inside and out-,” being walled in yet also open to the sky.
The solve rate for #5—“Its name ferries beauty and safety, too, with slick ’disiacs and a doting crew”—polar-plunged to about 26%. Yet the answer, along with extra clues harboring its maritime persuasion, was more or less right there in the text: beauty + safety + slick aphrodisiacs + crew = Fair Haven Oyster Company.
The answer to riddle #6, “At Chapel, this treasury’s wings are wed, by goddess of love on High overhead,” was clear enough to seven in 10 respondents—but also a bit coy. There’s little doubt what treasury’s wings span High Street at Chapel: the Yale University Art Gallery. Yet there’s little confirmation online about the identity of the winged nude figure presiding over the bridge that connects them: Aphrodite, goddess of love.
Finally, the first half of the last riddle, “Kissed someone here? Don’t hope for a prince; a Fresh one appeared but it’s decades since,” was meant to get you thinking about a toad, maybe by way of a frog. The provisional answer, then, must be Toad’s Place, confirmed by the fact that the Fresh Prince himself, Will Smith, performed there at least once during the late ’80s/early ’90s, before his acting career (mostly) stole him away from rapping.
So, who won? After tallying up the entries and using an automated number generator, we randomly selected… Melissa S., Sathvik N. and Sofía M.! Congratulations to them, as well as to Mateo P., the solver who solved them all. And to everyone who riddled with us: Thanks for playing, and we’ll see you next time!
Written by Dan Mims. Image 1, featuring Aphrodite at the Yale University Art Gallery, photographed by Dan Mims. Image 2, featuring oysters at Fair Haven Oyster Co., photographed by Katie Lloyd.
