An image by children’s book author and illustrator Mauri Kunnas. I always enjoy his images as puzzles, although Peliko is still not my favourite brand. One piece missing.
The Hunt for the Holy Grail, 2021-05-03
Tag: 2021
[Over the Rooftops], 2021-01-16
Another nameless Peliko puzzle. Since there is no title, I don’t know from what city this is, but I think it’s in Finland, since Peliko is a Finnish brand. One website had it listed as view over Turku, but there are houses like this in many Finnish cities, most of them built in the 30’s and 40’s.
Anyway, as a puzzle, this was very enjoyable even though Peliko quality is not that good, but the image was great.
Historical Map of the World, 2021-05-02
Great puzzle with an image by Verbiest from 1636. Wikipedia does know one Verbiest who was (among other things) a carthographer, but he would have been 13 in 1636. Perhaps this map is based on one from 1636, but actually made later? Or it’s another Verbiest. The map looks pretty good for Europe, Africa and parts of the Americas, but East Asia is pretty wonky, and Australia is present only as a hypothesis (Terra Australis Incognita, Unknown southern land). A lot of fun as a puzzle!
View from the Conservatory, 2021-01-20
It’s been a while since I did a Schmidt puzzle, and was reminded again what an excellent brand this is. A few years ago I did a Schmidt where the fit was looser than usual and the precision of the cut wasn’t all that good, but this was fantastic. The fit is a bit tighter than Ravensburger or Heye, which is fine when working on the puzzle, but a bit annoying when taking it apart, unless you’re prepared to leave it practically assembled for the next puzzler.
Anyway, this was enjoyable from start to finish. Great image and great quality!
Star Wars: Dark Side vs Light Side, 2021-01-20
I have to say I lost faith in the rebellion some years ago, and I expect there are one or two Star Wars movies out there that I haven’t even seen. The puzzle was enjoyable regardless 🙂
No pieces were missing, but one has been torn in two. Looks like it could have been done by a dog.
Dolphins, 2021-01-25
Very enjoyable 500 piece Clementoni. I like doing water, especially stormy seas, so this wave was fun. Would have been difficult in a larger piece count.
The Old Fisherman, 2021-01-17
A bit dark, but a nice image, and I (almost) always like Clementoni 500-piece puzzles.
Paradise Sunset, 2021-04-09 (22)
This is my final (and 22nd) post about Paradise Sunset. I managed to place all the sections together, although I was too lazy to actually connect them. Also, it was impossible to get the whole puzzle in the same photo, but here are a couple of photos:
I started the first section on April 19, 2019, so it took me about two years, although I did a lot of other puzzles between the sections. All in all, I worked on this for about 25 weeks. The first section (top left) took the longest, 11 weeks, but that was because I spent at least half of that time in Dortmund. The second section (bottom left) took 3,5 weeks and the third (top right) 3 weeks. I started on the last section straight away after I finished the third, and was a bit unmotivated, which is why it took me 7,5 weeks.
I actually think that this would have worked better as a smaller puzzle, because some of the photoshopping looked pretty bad close up, but from a distance, it looks very nice. Also, I didn’t really enjoy puzzling on the felt that I had to use in order to be able to roll the completed sections up, I’m very happy to be able to puzzle directly on the table again.
Working on this also made me think about the large puzzles I still have in my to-to pile. I have the 18K Ravensburger puzzle with four old maps, and the 40K Mickey Mouse puzzle (also Ravensburger) with 10 different images. I’ve decided to treat these puzzles as 4 and 10 4500- / 4000-piece puzzles, and I’m not going to connect the sections. I’ll just do one section and then take it apart. There is one puzzle where I will still use the felt roll-ups, and that is the 9K Bombardment of Algiers (also Ravensburger). That’s a beautiful image, and I will want to put it together. All of the other puzzles that I haven’t done yet will fit on my table in Helsinki (the table in Dortmund is a bit smaller and 5K puzzles won’t fit on it). I do, however, have two puzzles that I would like to do again one day, the 8K 2000 Years by Heye and the 10K Garden of Earthly Delights by Educa, and when I took them apart, I didn’t do it sections, so that the pieces are now mixed. Originally the Heye was 2×4000 pieces and the Educa 5×2000 pieces, and I’m not sure how I’ll be able to manage now that they are actually 8000 and 10 000 pieces…
Crazy Cats visit Kitty’s Cakes, 2021-01-26
Nice enough 500 piece Ravensburger, although I would have preferred more cakes and less cats 🙂 Also, the colours are kind of muted.
Old Map, 2021-01-10
This puzzle has a thin layer of cork on top of the cardboard. I certainly preferred this to the “wood-effect”, but it doesn’t age well. You can see some white dots on the puzzle where the cork layer has been worn away. I bought it used, so I don’t know how many times this has been completed, but the cork layer seems really fragile. Clementoni probably also decided that cork wasn’t a good idea, because I can’t remember seeing any other puzzles like this.
Puzzler1909 