Welcome D. S. Nelson with A Deadly Orientation

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Please welcome D. S. Nelson who is here with her latest release, A Deadly Orientation. She has a fabulous post that takes a look at an ancient myth and the practice of geocaching—something that has always fascinated me. And who can resist a treasure hunt? 🙂 Read on….

The Ultimate Treasure Hunt 

First of all I must give a huge thank you to Mae for inviting me over to talk writing, myth and legend with you all. To set the scene I’d like to tell you a story:

‘The moon is full and the lake lazily licks the shore in harmony with the gentle hum of voices from the hillside. The Balsa Muisca, a golden raft, is adrift in the middle of Lake Guatavita. Glistening in the light of the moon a naked man stands proudly on the raft, head held high his skin covered in golden dust. He is the new king of the Muisca people and this is his coronation.

Four burning torches stand at each corner of the raft. The air is heavy with the smell of incense. Strewn across the raft are gold, jewels, plaques, crowns and sacred items. The new king’s consorts reach down and throw the offerings into the water, the gold sacrificed to the gods and the lake. This is the lost gold of El Dorado.’ 

When I decided that the theme for the next Blake Hetherington Mystery was going to be geocaching I needed a way to link it to an interesting back-story. Geocaching is contemporary treasure hunting for the cool and as a geocacher you follow a set of co-ordinates to a cache. You can swap SWAG  (Stuff We All Get) at the cache and log your find on a central website. If you’re lucky you may even achieve the highly coveted FTF (First to Find). What better than to tie all of this together than with the ultimate treasure hunt: the search for the lost gold of El Dorado.

An Aztec drawing of figures in black on a gold background

Image courtesy of Pixabay

There are many theories as to what the lost gold of El Dorado actually is. Some think it is in the ‘House Of The Night’, a place where the sun sets, others believe the lost city has never been found, but the most popular line of thought is that the lost gold lies at the bottom of Lake Guatavita. The lake was used for the coronation ceremony of the new Muisca king and, as the story above describes, there was plenty of gold thrown into the lake.

By Andrew Bertram (World66) [CC BY-SA 1.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/1.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

By Andrew Bertram (World66) [CC BY-SA 1.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/1.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons

 Lake Guativita is high up on top of a steep sided hill in Columbia. Approximately five different attempts have been made to drain Lake Guatavita, the earliest of which was in 1545 when the conquistadors arrived in pre-Columbia.

A blue green lake surrounded by mountains

By Masanalv (Own work) [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC BY 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons

Antonio de Sepulveda made a second attempt in the 1580s and he used forced labour to cut a v shape into the side of the lake to try and drain it. Both these attempts failed. Interest was ignited again when in 1801 a German scientist, Alexander Von Humbolt, worked out that there could be as much as $300,000,000 at the bottom of the lake. Twenty years later Jose Ignacio Paris attempted the same strategy as Sepulveda again to no avail.

A more successful attempt was made by ‘The Company For The Exploration Of The Lagoon Of Guatavita’ when in 1898, they dug a tunnel into the side of the hill. This worked but within twenty-four hours the mud at the bottom of the lake was baked dry in the scorching sun. All the plunderers had amassed was approximately £500 nothing like the millions they had been promised.

In 1965 Lake Guatavita was declared a National Park, protecting it from any further interference. Is there more gold at the bottom of the lake? We’ll never really know, but the opening scene of ‘A Deadly Orientation,’ finds us on the lake with a group of people who’d like to find out.

To me the legend of El Dorado and attempts to drain Lake Guatavita are fascinating and this research formed the bases for the seventh Blake Hetherington Mystery.  Thanks again to Mae for inviting me over and I’d love to hear what you’ve heard about the lost gold of El Dorado.

Book cover of A Deadly Orientation by D. S. Nelson shows gold compass and knife over an old treasure map

‘A Deadly Orientation’ is available in e-book and paperback and you can get yours here.

If you’d like to connect with me, you can find me on Facebook, Instagram and my blog, Every Day’s A Mystery. I’ll see you there!

 

 

 

63 thoughts on “Welcome D. S. Nelson with A Deadly Orientation”

  2. Reblogged this on and commented:
    The lovely and very talented writer and cryptozoologist Mae Clair has invited me over to her blog today to talk about El Dorado – The Ultimate Treasure Hunt. Please do pop by abd visit Mae’s fantastic blog!

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply ↓

  4. Awesome! Both the info on geocaching and the premise of your book.
    I’m sure you it’ll soon become a bestseller. Such topics are fascinating
    Best of luck, Dawn!
    Carmen

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply ↓

  6. Oh, this is absolutely fascinating!! Geocaching in and of itself is interesting. Add to that the story of El Dorado, and it’s no wonder you wanted to have this in your novel. Thanks for sharing.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply ↓

  7. I watch the History Channel a lot, and there are two shows on (Expedition Unknown hosted by Josh Gates and America Unearthed hosted by Scott Wolter) that investigate lore like El Dorado. They go all over the world and explore all sorts of theories.

    The real life stories are fascinating. Novels that fictionalize such lore? Those are flat out joys to read. Best wishes, D.S.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply ↓

  16. Pingback: Reading Links…1/31/17 – Where Genres Collide

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