MB Super Challenge Series: Aspen Trees, Colorado

Aspen Trees, Colorado

Milton Bradley, Super Challenge (1985) Series #12

1540 pieces

31" x 23 1/2"

purchased opened (complete) from ebay ($4.75)

Difficulty level: super challenging

There are a lot of puzzles in Milton Bradley's "Super Challenge" series; this is the first one I have attempted. After an initial foray into the puzzle, it is indeed very difficult. Without a central or defining image, there's no clear area of attack--after doing the border I did the sky and then started on the grass. There are huge sections of red leaves and yellow leaves, but even after sorting all the pieces into piles there's no easy place to start. You just have to find a match and go from there. The problem with that, however, is that the pieces are very oddly shaped--most of them have at least one side that's mostly flat or has a small curve, so that it just abuts an adjacent piece, rather than locking in. (And the pieces just sort of "fall" together--if it has to "click" to another piece you're putting it in the wrong spot.) Furthermore, the pieces that do lock have a very loose fit, and with nothing other than the trees having a clear outline, it's sometimes tough to tell if two pieces that fit are actually supposed to go together. The colors on the puzzle, however, are much more vibrant, and the image more sharp than the photo on the box, making the box top of very little help--the box photo is also not cropped exactly like the image, so the top and right side don't match those corresponding pieces.

I started with the border and the little bit of sky, then was faced with 1400+ gray, green, yellow, and red pieces.

I should have done this one on a piece of white cardstock or something, since it looks like the same color as the floor (as seen through the glass table top). Next I attacked the grass and the red leaves, and started putting together any of the gray trees that abutted green or red.

When I was down to 250 or so pieces, I laid them out on white paper so they were easier to see, then sorted by shape--the oddly shaped "super challenge" pieces actually paired together very easily once I did this, and the last 200 pieces were a lot easier to slot (but still tricky even though they were all some shade of gray).

Brief panic at the end when I was one piece short. The piece was located in the oven. (Don't ask.)

Despite its technical flaws (loose pieces and a soft, incorrectly cropped box image), this one was fun. A lot of these Super Challenge series puzzles look brutal, so I will probably end up getting more of them at some point.

Golden Masterpiece Series: Rembrandt

Rembrandt, Young Girl at an Open Half-Door

Golden, 1970s(?), Masterpiece Series

1505 pieces

27"x33"

purchased sealed (complete) from ebay ($20)

Difficulty level: Very tough bordering on brutal

There are ten puzzles in Golden's Masterpiece Series (that I've identified: Rembrandt, Canaletto, Cezanne, Robert, Toulouse Lautrec, Courbet, Chardin, Degas, Renoir, and Manet), but this is the first one I've picked up.

This is where I got after one evening of working on the easy parts:

Once you assemble the frame, head, hands, necklace, and start on the wooden walls, you are left with over 1000 pieces in varying shades of brown:

I had to get a reading lamp and sit like a forensic examiner dividing all the brown pieces into groups, depending on their coloration--mottled brown (upper door), brown with black streaks (lower door), black with horizontal brown streaks (upper dress), black with vertical brown streaks (lower dress), to the point where I asked myself "Am I insane?" but then I'd snap together six or seven pieces and dove back in. Still very slow going, since the majority of the pieces left had little in terms of color variation.

Once I had enough pieces in place horizontally, I realized that for the most part, each horizontal row has a repeating pattern of two types of pieces.

Since everything left was either a dark brown or black with little to differentiate them, I separated them by shape. Then I just determined the types of pieces needed for a row across, and started using trial and error, and the big expanses of dark brown and black began filling in:

The last 218 pieces were tough. Almost no variation in color and all were the same basic shape, but it's done. A fun puzzle and a beautiful painting, but I think for the next one I will do something that's not so dark.