On 13 May 2025, someone on Reddit casually announced they’d buried $10,000 somewhere in San Francisco. The treasure was inside a 22-pound metal chest and consisted of cash and gold. The only way to find it? Solve a poem packed with cryptic clues. The organizers expected the hunt to take weeks. To their disbelief, it took three guys and a dog just over an hour.

To avoid digging violations, the chest was hidden under a shallow burial on Mount Sutro.

The masterminds behind the hunt weren’t influencers or marketers. Two individuals, who wish to remain anonymous, decided to make the fantasy of treasure hunting a reality for San Franciscans. What followed was a digital and physical scramble across the city’s hills, ruins, and parks.

The duo was inspired by the thrill of The Goonies, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and Forrest Fenn’s infamous Rocky Mountain treasure hunt. They planted a 22-pound chest, hoping it would remain undiscovered for weeks, maybe even months.

Posting under the Reddit username buriedtreasure2025, they announced the buried treasure along with a riddle on the r/sanfrancisco subReddit.

The post exploded! With thousands of upvotes and hundreds of comments, there were plenty of skeptics, assuming it to be a marketing ploy.

“This better not be an ad for some weird AI lamp subscription,” one commenter joked.

Others were concerned about the legal risks of digging in public places. Golden Gate Park allows digging with a permit, but Mount Sutro forbids it without city approval.

The organizers preemptively dodged legal snares by choosing a shallow burial in an area where light digging wouldn’t disturb the landscape. They also made a plea: “Respect the city, fill your holes, and pack out trash.”

Each stanza of the poem led to a location, and all the locations, when marked on a map, formed X.

The poem that kicked off the hunt was full of local references, some obscure enough to throw off anyone who didn’t know SF like the back of their hand.

One line mentioned “Eighteen Bold Letters, …in a clearing,” which turned out to be a sculpture installation from India Basin that most locals had forgotten existed.

Another referenced “a dark room’s view,” pointing toward the old Camera Obscura near Ocean Beach.

Each stanza hinted at a location, and when plotted on a map, the clues formed a rough X.

What finally gave the location away was a glow-in-the-dark marker that was visible only under UV light. It would guide people to a fork in the trail, where the chest lay under eight inches of soil.

Half the spoils were in precious metals, such as gold nuggets, silver coins, and copper ingots.

Austin Theriault, TJ Lee, and Erik Bahri weren’t professional puzzle-solvers. They were just friends who saw the post, thought, “Why not?”, and started texting theories back and forth during the workday, scanning  National Park Service maps.

They soon figured that Sutro Baths was a red herring. As it’s a very public place, it was way too risky.  Plus, one clue referenced a “dark room’s view,” which made them think of the Camera Obscura. It led them to the Open Space Reserve in Sutro.

With Theriault’s dog, Franz, in tow, the group hiked to the intersection of West Ridge Trail. They dug into a hollow framed by large boulders and unearthed the prize after just over an hour of physical searching.

“We expected it to take at least days,” the original posters later admitted. “We’re shocked. And impressed.”

The haul was a strange mix of valuable and sentimental. Around half the worth was in gold nuggets, silver coins, and copper ingots. The rest was pure San Francisco nostalgia.

Tucked inside the chest were a trio of Barry Bonds baseball cards, a crisp $2 bill, and an old 1915 Panama-Pacific coin. A small glass bottle of local sand, a ticket from San Francisco’s 1939 World Fair, and an old ticket from San Francisco’s 1939 World Fair added to the chest’s weight.

The duo behind the adventure is up for another treasure hunting episode if they find someone willing to help fund it.