Read – think – escape!

In every DELTA Escape Adventure you find yourself in a situation

which you need to escape from. And in order to escape, you need
to read each chapter, understand the situation, and solve the
problems you encounter along the way. You may need to think
hard to solve the problems, but there are clues at hand to help …

About DELTA Escape Adventures

Escape games and books are popular with teenagers in their L1.
The monolingual Escape Adventure Readers therefore provide
students with genuine motivation to read: students need to
read the text to find information which will help them solve an
enigma. They are doing more than simply reading a story.
DELTA Escape Adventures:
have a clear goal for the students: to read in order to
escape from something or something
have clear goals for teachers: to motivate students to read
by giving them a clear purpose
focus on task-achievement
concentrate on problem-solving
combine fact and fiction
are ideal for differentiation and inclusion: everyone can
participate and share their different levels of subject
knowledge
are CLIL-based: there is the potential to teach or revise
content from other subjects and learn about a specific
geographical area. Each chapter contains a CLIL-based
fact file.
incorporate 21st century skills
include annotations to help students with understanding
challenging words, and language-based activities
are fun and challenging!

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They are primarily designed to be used with students aged 11-15.
Students can read them for self-study purposes, and they can be
used in class.
Each title includes these features:
Before you start
Annotations
Talking points
Think about it boxes
Activities
Build your vocabulary: activities, mind map, glossary
Find out more
Answer key (for the activities – not the enigmas)
The solutions for the enigmas are in this document.

About The American River

AD’s parents like to take the family out on “Sunday History”
days to teach their children about the world around them. On
one of these Sundays, AD (you) is trapped in Miner’s Haven, an
abandoned 1840s mining village on the American River, near
Sacramento. AD has to solve a series of enigmas related to the
Gold Rush in order to escape the situation and return to the
normal world. AD not only learns about the Gold Rush, but
perhaps more importantly, what the true treasures in life are.

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 You are AD, the main character in this book.
In fact, you’ll live in its pages until you
manage to escape from them …
How? By solving the enigmas at the end
of each chapter, which will give you the
number of the first page of the following
chapter.
Eventually, everything will make sense and you’ll escape, having
relived the adventure you had on your thirteenth birthday, in
a deserted hotel in an abandoned 1850’s Californian Gold Rush
town, called Miner’s Haven, right by the majestic American River.
Along the way, you’ll encounter a range of curious characters,
including a bandit, a bounty hunter, a native American guide,
circus performers, an assayer, a botanist, a photographer and a
murdered man.

So, just how do you escape?

Follow these guidelines:
Make sure you read the introduction to each chapter: this
will energize your mind for the challenge ahead.
Pay close attention to everything you read and see: there
are clues everywhere!
At the end of each chapter, you need to find a number. This
number is the number of the first page of the next chapter.
Your goal is to reach the last chapter and finish the book.
Read the fact files. These will give you background
information about the Californian Gold Rush and the people
who experienced it and this information could be useful.
You could cheat, of course, but this book will let
everybody else who reads or is reading it know that you’ve
done so; and that would just be really embarrassing, right?
That said, if you do need a clue, you can use the Delta
Augmented App clue when indicated.

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Plot summary
On AD’s birthday, during one of the family’s customary “Sunday
History” days out from their well-appointed home in Los Gatos,
in the area known popularly as “Silicon Valley” (just outside
San José, in Santa Clara County, California). AD, a disaffected,
thirteen-year-old, Californian teenager of German and Mexican
descent, whose gender is never revealed, but who “represents”
the reader (“you”), has been obliged to visit Miner’s Haven, an
abandoned 1850’s Century mining village in the American River,
North Fork, in El Dorado County, near Sacramento, California.
During the visit, AD is told by his or her parents, Karl Dresler
and Rosa Murrieta, to check out an old, dilapidated hotel, called
“The American River Hotel,” whilst his or her younger twin
brothers, Jake and Elmore, eight, and his or her sister, Selena, ten,
and his parents check out the town’s long-abandoned saloon.
How AD manages to escape from the hotel informs the action of
the story.
AD’s parents, Karl and Rosa, are in their mid-forties and have
their own very successful company, called Murriet@, whose core
business is to provide Silicon Valley companies with immersive,
interactive experiences for company conferences, product
unveiling events and trade fairs.
Karl and Rosa also offer a successful consultancy service related
to UX (user experience) design, both teach class at San José State
University and are also fascinated by the history of California,
especially as it relates to the influx of foreign and East Coast
49ers, amongst whom were their own respective German and
Mexican ancestors.
As for AD, he or she is a budding print maker, enamored of
Albrecht Dürer, the German Renaissance artist from Nuremberg,
the son of a successful Hungarian goldsmith, and whose initial
fame arrived in response to his woodcut prints, and whose
initials AD shares.

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Psychologically, AD is at a point of his or her development
whereby he or she finds it almost impossible to see his or
her place in their world and in his or her family clearly; a
state of mind that has led him or her to become increasingly
withdrawn, surly, uncooperative, and argumentative, which is
why, he suspects, his parents send him off by himself to visit The
American Hotel.
AD is sometimes amused, sometimes irritated by the perpetual
goofiness and gung-ho spirit of his or her younger twin brothers,
Jake and Elwood, whose names reflect their parents love of
classic American Soul Music and the film “The Blues Brothers.”
A tacit non-aggression pact operates between the twins, as a unit,
and AD.
AD’s relationship with his or her sister Selena, on the other hand,
is infinitely more complex. Named by Karl and Rosa after the
Ancient Greek Moon goddess (because she was born under a
full Moon), Selena is disparaging of AD, who she finds contrary,
rudder-less, and boring.
AD’s opinion of his or her younger sister is similarly unforgiving.
AD thinks Selena is spoiled, takes advantage of her parents
happy-go-lucky, new age, Californian Buddhist outlook to satisfy
her rampant, pre-teen consumerism, and that she is well on her
way to becoming a valley girl.
On Sunday, 13 March 2022, then, the day of AD’s thirteenth
birthday, in their recently renovated, turquoise 1960s camper
van, Karl Dresler and Rosa Murrieta and their kids take the
Interstate 80, up to the Sierra Nevada Mountains, then drive
along the American River, North Fork, to Miner’s Haven, an
abandoned Gold Rush mining town where Karl and Rosa
have secretly installed an immersive, interactive escape room
experience in a hotel that AD has to “escape from.”
Thanks to AD’s parents’ ingenuity, AD is obliged to figuratively
dive into The American River and to emerge refreshed, having

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discovered how the river (which might be seen as a metaphor
for American history itself) has given meaning and purpose
to peoples ranging from the indigenous, acorn-eating Maidu;
through to the fish-dependent Chumash; the Spanish-speaking,
cattle-farming, Californianos, who were forced to witness how
Mexico sold California to the United States two days before gold
was discovered at nearby Sutter’s Mill; the tens of thousands of
Chinese, European and South American immigrants who arrived
in the area in search of El Dorado; the East Coast migrants
hoping for a better life; and the modern tech entrepreneurs (like
AD’s own parents) who still flock to the area today in search of
their big break.
And, of course, when AD eventually leaves the hotel, clutching
a map showing him or her how get to some treasure map, she
or he presumes is gold, it is actually AD’s family that is the
treasure he or she must locate, and, having “escaped” his or her
parents’ cleverly thought-out, Gold Rush-themed, immersive,
and interactive escape room experience, and received a very, very
special present, AD will never see the world or his or her own
place in it in quite the same way again.

Using The American River with your class

In class
About the book: explain that the students are the main
characters in the book and that the style is “you, your etc.”,
and that they need to escape from the situation they find
themselves in by reading the text carefully and solving
the enigmas at the end of each chapter. They need to solve
each enigma, so that they know which page and chapter to
turn to next.
Read alone, work together. Work through enigmas and
activities together. But let them read on their own. That
way everyone can work at their own pace and extract

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 different pieces of information. This will be helpful as they
work communicatively in groups to solve the enigmas and
complete the activities.
Find out more. Students can work together and show
initiative to research and develop projects based on the
topics that come up in the Escape Adventure.

The California
Gold Rush
Albrecht
Dürer The American
Dream

Joaquín
Native
Murrieta
Americans

the
paranormal settlers
immersive
experiences immigrants

Out of class
Assign students a reading task as homework so that they
come to class prepared to solve the enigmas, or an enigma
together.
Get students to complete activities at home.
Get students to try to figure out an enigma on their own,
so that they come to class ready to share and compare
their answers.

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Answer key – the enigmas
Sunday history days
What the text on page 22 says:

You go back into the bedroom.

You still don’t know which two digits open the combination
lock on the wardrobe doors.
You think hard.
Yes! That’s it! That thing that both Mom and Dad have been
chanting non-stop recently. Their “mantra.” You’re sure there
were words from the number circles in it … You look at the
circles and see that the two words in your parents’ “mantra”
correspond to two numbers on the wooden circles.
You try the numbers on the combination lock and it opens. Listen
to the clue! ? You can open the two-digit combination lock on the
wardrobe with this number: _______ Now turn to page _______.

What you need to do:

Join the circle halves on page 23 and make a note of what each
number is called, for example “tskumu” is “4” and “tspa” is “9”.

Chumash word Number

pake’ et 1
’iš kom̓ 2
ma sǝx 3
tsku mu 4
yǝtipake’ es 5
yǝti’iš kom̓ 6
yǝti masǝx 7
mal awa 8
ts pa 9
ka’a škom 10

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How do you know which page number to choose? You need to
locate the mantra AD’s parents chant, which is on page 11
(and is also the title of the chapter):

But hey, “Think positive, be positive and positive things will

happen!,” your dad always says, before he half-sings, half-says
the new mantra both he and your mom just LOVE: “Yǝti’iškom̓
malawa” which, you suppose, means something profound in
Japanese.

You’ll discover that “Yǝti’iškom̓ means “6” and that “malawa”

means “8”: so page 68!
First page of next chapter:
68
?
Listen to the clue!

Page 23
Find the mantra on page 11 and then match the halves of the
circles that form the words.

You’re a smart kid, AD

What the text on page 32 says:

“The river,” you say to yourself. “It all goes back to the river.”
You look for element symbols that make up the word “river”
but get nowhere. Was Jean-Pierre Aurelian talking about The
American River?
You make the word “American” using five elements, none of
which is carbon.
You add up the corresponding atomic numbers and get
_______. Then you subtract 198 from that number.

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What you need to do:
You need to find these elements in the periodic table on page 33:
Americum (Am) 95, Erbium (Er) 68, Iodine (I) 53,
Calcium (Ca) 20, Nitrogen (N) 7.
Remember, Jean-Pierre Aurelian has told you not to use Carbon (C).
AmErICaN
Then you add the atomic numbers of these elements:
95 + 68 + 53 + 20 + 7 = 243. Then, as Jean-Pierre Aurelian
explains, you must subtract 198 from 243 = 45.
First page of next chapter:
45
?
Listen to the clue!

Page 32
The _______ River. How can you spell the missing word using
elements from the periodic table, without using “C” for carbon?

Murrieta’s real hideaway

What the text on page 43 says:

AGARRASIL OICANGI .ton syas rehtruf dnA .tidnab

detarbelec eht ,ateirruM niuqaoJ fo daeh elbatirev eht saw dna
si evoba detibihxe sa daeh eht taht dna ,ateirruM niuqaoJ htiw
detniauqca llew saw tnenoped tahT dna noitibihxe no won
,niuqaoJ fo daeh degella eht nees sah eh tahT - :syas ,nrows ylud
gnieb ,aronoS fo ,aggarasiL oicangI :ss ,OCSICNARF NAS FO
YTNUOC – AINROFILAC FO ETATS

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What you need to do:
Find the letters in bold in the letter, write them down and read
them from the last one to the first one: “It is a lie.” This sentence
corresponds to page 85 on the key given by the mirror.
First page of next chapter:
85
?
Listen to the clue!

You need to find the bold letters in the text of the poster when
you look at it from the back.The letters are in reverse order,
however! Then match the message to the key on page 44.

Seeing the elephant

What the text on page 62 says:
In Uwe Dresler’s letter, a letter from each of these words is
missing: now, wherever, painting, earning, feel, work, well-liked,
told, dangerous, much.
What you need to do:
These letters (o – r – n – e – f – o – w – t – o – u) allow you to
from the words: two, four and one. Which can be arranged as
241, 412, 142 and 124.
Pages 241 and 412 do not exist in the book, so the next page must
be 142 or 124. Page 142 is not the first page of a chapter, so the
page number you need is 124.
First page of next chapter:
124
?
Listen to the clue!

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Find and write down the missing letters from the words in Uwe
Dresler’s letter. You can make three number words with these.
These number words can be put in order in four different ways to
create four three-digit numbers. You need the smallest number of
these.

A time tunnel
What the text on page 75 says:

They haven’t forgotten about you hermano.

Don’t be frightened, but there’s a price on your head, so you
must lie low.
Making money legally is almost impossible if you‘re Mexican,
Peruvian or Chilean: “greasers” they call us now, or “tarheads”,
if you‘re Chinese.
The Anglos want all the gold, but we won‘t be beaten. Be
careful, I‘ll look after the family the best I can.
Stay strong!
J.T.

What you need to do:

Read the letter and ‘listen’ to it in your head. You should be able
to ‘hear’ the four underlined numbers above. Next, add these
numbers up: for = four =4; ten = ten = 10; ten = ten = 10; ten =
ten = 10. 4 + 10 + 10 + 10 = 34.
First page of next chapter:
34

?
Listen to the clue!

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Page 76

They haven’t forgotten about you hermano.

Don’t be frightened, but there’s a price on your head, so you
must lie low.
Making money legally is almost impossible if you‘re Mexican,
Peruvian or Chilean: “greasers” they call us now, or “tarheads”,
if you‘re Chinese.
The Anglos want all the gold, but we won‘t be beaten. Be
careful, I‘ll look after the family the best I can.
Stay strong!
J.T.

Sleepyhead
What the text on page 84 says:

You have one opportunity to try one key!” is written on the

envelope. You pick it up, open it and find five keys inside, all of
which are identical, except for the numbers etched onto them.
You go back to the book and read the text again.

What you need to do:

There is a letter missing from the first word of every line on the
wildflower book page.
These letters are: Of, native, especially, tree, has, rarely, examples,
even, nearly, indigestion, not, edible.
Once separated, they spell “one” – “three” – “nine”: 139.
First page of next chapter:
139

?
Listen to the clue!

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Page 84.
Read the wildflower book page and decide which letters are
missing from the start of each line.

Fishhooks
What the text on page 96 says:

“What is the largest number you can see in the last three
scrapbook entries, AD?” she asks.
Your cellphone begins to vibrate again and you hear the same
heavy footsteps from the room above as in Murrieta’s real hideaway.
DANGER! flashes on your cellphone screen and the battery
charge is at 2%.
You look at the description of the fishhook J.T. (James Thomas,
presumably) paid for.
“Now double the first two digits, for example, 17 would be 34.
Then multiply the last two digits, for example, 22 would be
2 multiplied by 2, which would be 8. Add the two results, for
example, 1722 would be 42,” says the young woman’s voice.

What you need to do:

You need to identify that the largest number in the three
scrapbook entries is the date 1852. Then you must double 18, to
get 36 and then multiply 5 by 2 to get 10 then multiply 10 by 2 to
get 20. When you add 36 and 20, the answer (and the number of
the page you should now turn to) is 56.
First page of next chapter:
56
?
Listen to the clue!

You need to find the largest number in the scrapbook entries. It is

a date beginning with eighteen.

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For want of a nail
What the text on page 108 says:

“Sarah wrote the same number in letters six times in her

journal entry, AD. Multiply that number by the number of times
it appears and then subtract one from the result.”
You look at the letter again and do what `A`wa`y says, while
you try, and fail, to remember the door numbers you tried to
memorize earlier.
“Say the number, AD.”

What you need to do:

You need to find a number that is repeated in Sarah Thomas
journal entry (thirteen) and write down how many times (six)
it is repeated in the entry. Multiply 6 by 13: 78. Then subtract 1.
The answer is 77.
First page of next chapter:
77
?
Listen to the clue!

Look for the same number in Sarah’s journal entry. How many
times is the number repeated? Multiply these two numbers and
subtract one from the result.

Shot like a dog, by a dog

What the text on page 122 says:

“There are letters scored into the dice, AD.”

Your blood chills: it is the dead man, Robert’s, voice you hear.
“The letters make a number.”

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What you need to do:
Write the letters you see on the dice (from top to bottom and left
to right: E – W – T – T – F – N – Y – O – U _ R.
Now order these two form two numbers, “twenty” and “four”: 24.
This is the number you need.
First page of next chapter
24
?
Listen to the clue!

Page 123
Look at the dice. The lines form letters. Write these letters down
and turn them if you need to so you can recognize them.

Hocus pocus
What the text on page 138 says:

You find the skull that looks most like the one on the
matchbox. You can’t help thinking that the number on the back
of the matchbox might be relevant. But how? You look at the
back of the matchbox again, and realize that there is more than
just a number there.

What you need to do:

Look at the illustration. Find the acorn which looks most like
the one on the matchbox. Look carefully at the eyes, nose and
mouth. The most similar acorn is number 120. But 120 is not the
answer. You need to use the number 23 (the number on the back
of the matchbox somehow). Looking at it carefully, you realize
that there is a dash either side of the number. Or is it a minus
sign? You decide to try this out. 120 – 23 = 97.

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First page of next chapter
97
?
Listen to the clue!

Page 138
Match the skull on the matchbox to a numbered, carved skull
on the table. The number on this skull is the number of the next
room you must enter. Then look carefully at what you see – not
just the number - on the back of the matchbox. What’s the
connection?

Pinyin
What the text on page 148 says:

You kneel down by the abacus and wonder what to do with it.
You sense it is your way out of the room.
The woman starts to repeat her murder ballad.
And then you know what number you have to try. It works
and the door clicks open.

What you need to do:

The number on the abacus is a possibility, but if you go to that
page number /127(, you’ll see it doesn’t start a chapter. However,
the number mentioned in the murder ballad (109) does start a
chapter.
First page of next chapter
109
?
Listen to the clue!

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Page 148
There are two possible answers to the enigma in this room.
You’ve seen one and heard another. But which one is the number
you need?

Answer key – the activities

Sunday history trips
AD, you; Selena Dresler, your sister; Rosa Murrieta
Dresler, your mom; Jake and Elmore Dresler, your twin
brothers; Karl Dresler, your dad.
One half of a wooden number circle.
1. c.; 2. b.; 3. a.

You’re a smart kid, AD

True: He had a French accent.; He had a beard.; His office
was in The American River Hotel.; He was a chemist.
The periodic table.
1. b.; 2 a.; 3. b.

Murrieta’s real hideaway

True: He lived in The American River Hotel.
A box of matches.
1. c.; 2. b.; 3. a.

It all goes back to the river

10.; Jean-Pierre Aurelian; Joaquín Murrieta’s room;
Jean-Pierre Aurelian’s room; Somebody being shot, a baby
crying, footsteps, a woman singing.
A treasure map.
1. c.; 2. b.; 3. c.

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Seeing the elephant
`A`wa`y: Helps you, A Native American Indian; Uwe
Dresler: From Nuremberg, Once lived in Brooklyn, NYC,
A photographer.
An edelweiss flower,
1. c.; 2. a.; 3. c.

A time tunnel
True: AD’s home is in Los Gatos.
`A`wa`y (Mona)
a. too = two, to = 22;
b. before = four = 84, to = two; c. forgotten = ten;
d. ate = eight; e. tent = ten; basics = 6; for = four = 164

Sleepyhead
Real names for flowers: oracle oak, California coffeeberry;
wild cucumber.
The leaves and berries of a toyon plant.
1. c.; 2. b.; 3. c.

Fishhooks
True: He came to California from Mexico with some of his
family.; He was the most wanted man in California.; He
was a hero for some people.
A primitive fishhook.
1. c.; 2. a.; 3. c.

For want of a nail …

The thirteen colonies that declared independence
from Great Britain, in 1776.
An embroidery hoop
“For want of a nail, the shoe was lost. For want of a shoe,
the horse was lost. For want of a horse, the rider was lost.

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 For want of a rider, the battle was lost. For want of a battle,
the kingdom was lost. And all for the want of a horseshoe
nail.”

Shot like a dog, by a dog

I love you.
Dice.
True: b.; d.; e.

Hocus pocus
to make sure that = to organise things so that something
happens; to go up = to increase; to go down = to decrease;
to run out = to cease to exist, to end; to stand by = to be
positioned next to.
The skull is made from an acorn.
a. Bon appetit!: Enjoy your meal; b. Hey, presto!: The
magic has happened! c. Cul-de-sac: A street with no exit;
d. Ciao!: Bye-bye!

Pinyin
The clothes belong to Siamese twins.
127
“Young girls, if you will listen, a story I'll relate;
That happened near Fort Thomas in the old Kentucky State.
Upon a frozen January day the dreadful deed was done;
By Jackson and by Walling; how cold Pearl's blood did run!
She thought it was her husband's hand she could trust both
night and day;
They had been married but for one hundred and nine days.”

Image sources
All image sources used in this document are listed in 501154 The
American River.

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