Turbo Pudding
Somewhere up the Long River, a picnic went wrong. The game never says whose it was, and nobody in Kettlecrest seems to mind. The gulls certainly don’t: the credits thank them as “the gulls, who shared the picnic.” Everything you pick up during a race came out of that one bad afternoon, and it’s Friday, so here is where it all ended up.
The punt that started it all
Along the river you keep passing the scene of the crime: a picnic punt lying upside down at the water’s edge, with its parasol still stuck in the bank and leaning out over it. Baskets keep slipping out from under the punt and drifting downstream in a loose string, now and then two at a time. They drift slower than any boat, so you always catch them up.
Some baskets got further. A few hang on short lines behind big cork floats anchored in the middle of the river, swinging with the current. Others are stuck in the slack water behind a big rock, going round and round, waiting for whoever dares to pass close. Every boat meets the same baskets, the leader and the last boat alike, and each boat gets one basket from each spot.
What was in the baskets
Whoever packed this picnic packed strangely. There’s a Tow Line, a Splash Pump, a Picnic Blanket, a Flat Iron, a Ripple Rattle, a Beaver Plank and a Siphon Straw. Each one helps on the river in its own way. Then there are the three things you throw, which are the reason nobody ever invites this person to a picnic again.
The Cross Goose is a wild river goose, gray-brown with a black neck and a white brow drawn into a permanent frown. You let it go backward. It flies at the boat behind you, lands on the edge and grabs the paddle for two seconds. Hop over its swoop or steer aside, and it just flies away.
The Frog Bucket is a dented tin pail with two green frogs peeking over the rim. Lob it ahead and the frogs land in somebody’s boat and sit on the paddle for three seconds, which slows down both the paddling and the steering. A hop shakes them off. Dame Dambury, who runs the dams, leaves a note on one of her races that sums it up: “A lady does not get frogged.”
The third one is a giant egg Whisk. Where it lands, it churns the water into a ring of foam and spins anyone inside off their line. None of the three ever chase you. Each is thrown at the spot where its target will be, so a sidestep or a well-timed hop always gets you out of trouble. As Nib puts it, “Something flying at you? Hop! I learned it from the frogs.”
Gulls with full pockets
The gulls who raided the picnic now fly over the race and drop their loot. Every boat has its own gull clock, the same for the leader and for the last boat, so nobody gets more help just for being behind. A gull lets its prize go a little ahead of you, and a shadow on the water shows where it will splash about a second before it lands. Paddle through the splash to take it, or hop and snatch it out of the air.
A gull can bring a basket, a Knitted Heart on a cork ring, or a surprise bundle tied up in a plaid kerchief. Hearts come more often when you are low on them, never because of your place. Fennel approves: “The gulls drop knitted hearts. Two will keep you warm.”
The Old Boot does nothing
A surprise bundle opens with a puff. More than half the time there’s an item inside, sometimes a heart, and sometimes just river junk. A Seed Cake leaves crumbs, and a gull swoops in at once with a prize right ahead of you. A Bedspring makes your next hop a big one. And the Old Boot is an old boot. Your hero wears it upside down as a hat for six seconds, and that’s all it does.
Nib, for one, loved it: “Gull bundles! One had a boot in it. I wore it.” What comes out of each bundle is drawn for that bundle and that boat, never by your place in the race.
Fill the Finds page
Every new kind of thing you pick up goes into the Finds page of your Album, fifteen in all, from the Tow Line to the Bedspring. Empty spots just say “Not found yet.” Glacier Gate and Pinewood Rapids are free to play in your browser at kettlecrest.com. The full game, all six reaches to the sea, is $4.99, paid once. More about the game is on the Kettlecrest page.
