PUFFCLOUD EXPEDITION: a printable escape room card game for ages 7 to 11
Once a year the Puffcloud islands float down to Home Hill. Your crew climbs aboard, the rope snaps, and the islands drift away. The only way home is the Long Slide inside the Cloud Pyramid, and its door opens with five sky pebbles. Mizzle the puffin shows the way. Be home by sunset!
THIS IS AN ESCAPE ROOM CARD GAME, played with 52 cards on a table. It is not a book and not a worksheet pack: there are no pages to turn. You print the cards, cut them out (two cuts a sheet) and sort them into six envelopes.
HOW IT PLAYS (about 90 minutes, 1 to 4 players)
- Read a card and solve its puzzle together
- The answer is the NUMBER OF THE NEXT CARD, so the cards check your answers
- The next card must also show the same little sky sign (an acorn, a kite, a lantern), so a right answer is confirmed twice
- On every island you CHOOSE YOUR PATH: one puff is a gentle breeze, two puffs a strong wind
- Both paths meet at the island's Windgate. Open it to win a sky pebble
- Five pebbles open the Pebble Door of the Cloud Pyramid, and the Long Slide takes you home
Two Paths, Two Levels
- Gentle paths (ages 7 to 8): counting, adding and taking away
- Windy paths (ages 9 to 11): bigger numbers, times tables to 10 x 10, more thinking
- One game uses 18 of the 29 puzzles. Play again on the other paths for eleven new puzzles
- A halfway camp lets you stop after island 3 and finish on another day
29 Puzzles Of 23 Kinds
- 13 kinds of math pyramid puzzle: Puff Stack, Seed Stack, Gap Stack, Number Basket, Shrinking Stack, Picture Puffs, Kite Line, Times Stack, Leaky Cloud, Sign Stack, Fog Patches, Twin Stacks and More or Less
- 2 kinds of pyramid path puzzle: Hop Trail and Cloud Steps
- 8 card and map puzzles: Kite Count, Wind Walk, Bubble Chain, Map Hop, Pinwheel Turns, Lantern Strings (two cards laid side by side), Lantern Line and Rain Gauges
- The puzzles get harder island by island, and each sits a step below the top of its age band, so a crew can finish it together
Nobody Gets Stuck
- Three hints for every puzzle: a nudge, the method, the answer
- Friendly "gust" cards catch the most likely slips and give a tip
- Ten suns to keep: a hint or a gust costs one. Nobody can lose
- Answer pages with every puzzle solved, and a chart of the whole deck
WHAT YOU GET (instant download, 4 PDF files)
- The kit, US Letter (36 pages)
- The kit, A4 (36 pages)
- Cards-Double-Sided, US Letter and A4 (26 pages each): the same cards with numbered backs, if you like to print on both sides
- Free bonus folder (QR code inside): Thunderhead Island, a bonus trail of 8 cards with 5 expert puzzles (ages 9 to 12), blank cards to make your own island, and an ink-saver edition of the whole kit
Inside The Kit
- 52 cards on 13 sheets: 29 puzzle cards, 6 island cards, 5 sky pebble cards, 6 gust cards, 2 secret sun cards, 2 helper cards, a start card and an end card
- The Puffcloud Map, an Expedition Log, six envelope labels and a stand-up Mizzle
- How to Play (one page to read out loud) and set-up steps for the grown-up
- Hints, answers, and a certificate with type-in names
- Six optional fold-up island pockets to use in place of envelopes
You Will Need
A printer (colour looks best; ink-saver pages are in the bonus folder), 17 sheets of paper, scissors or a paper trimmer, tape, six envelopes (A6 or C6 size or bigger) or zip-top bags, pencils and scrap paper. About 30 minutes to print, cut and sort.
Good To Know
- Digital download only: nothing is shipped.
- Print at 100% (actual size), on one side of the paper.
- A grown-up or an older child helps the youngest players to read and check.
- Play times are plans, not promises: no child has timed this game for us. Younger crews may like two sittings. Hints keep every crew moving.
- A sunny story with no holiday theme: good for family game night, rainy days, birthdays, sleepovers, homeschool and classroom reward time.
- Not suitable for children under 3 (small paper parts).
- Love math pyramids? Creouts Publishing also publishes math pyramid puzzle books in paperback: see creouts.com/pyramid-puzzle-books/.
License
For one family, one party or one classroom. Print as many copies as you need for your own players. No resale, sharing, uploading or claiming as your own; no AI training.
Digital download, nothing is shipped. Because files can be copied at once, we cannot take them back after download; if something is wrong with your file, write to us and we will fix or refund it.
