370 zelda breath of the wild - taming and naming blondie the horse

Dear Readers,

I went to the Outskirt Stable and hung out there for a while, doing some treasure hunting and finding Koroks. I got attacked by the Yiga a lot as well. I guess I'm just cursed forever to be attacked by these guys randomly and as often as the skeleton enemies.

One of the old quests I had for ages was to tame a pure white horse for an old man who was staying at this stable. I decided to take it on and hike all the way to Safula Hill.

After a few more Yiga attacks I found the pure white horse that was here. I got on its back and it took a while to tame, but now that I was at maximum stamina I had no problem at all with taming it. I think I remember having trouble with it before when I only had one stamina wheel. I'm not sure though. I'd have to look it up.

I rode the horse back to the stable, soothing it as we went along. I named the horse "Blondie" because it was a beautiful white horse with a golden mane and I figured the old man here longed for beauty in this world. When he saw Blondie he said he was so happy to have lived so long in this godforsaken world. He had memories of his grandfather telling him tales about Princess Zelda's horse. He gave me royal horse equipment too, so it looked even more beautiful with the colours and Triforce symbols on it.

I fed Blondie a few apples to max out our bond. She's different to Spotty. She has a wild temperament and she's got higher speed. I'll see more of what she's like when I take her out for a ride.

369 zelda breath of the wild - nice easy fight at dah kaso shrine

Dear Readers,

I haven't had the shrine radar running for a long time. I turned it on while leaving Gerudo Canyon to go back to Hyrule.

I got an alert while crossing the bridges. I never noticed it before but there was a shrine directly underneath one of them next to the water. I parachuted down to it and went in.

There was a minor test of strength inside. I hadn't done one in a while and it was nice to see all the pillars again! I destroyed the Guardian Scout here in no time at all. I was hardened from major battles and I had big swords for days.

368 zelda breath of the wild - tilting the controller at joloo nah shrine

Dear Readers,

After the Goron heat test, I went in here to do this puzzle.

Well, it was two puzzles. The first one involved this block with fans I had to rotate with the controller by tilting it around. I had to make them blow into the propellers to open the gate and keep it open. I used the wind to grab the treasure chest first, then I aimed the fans at the propellers.

The trouble was, two of the propellers were elevated with pressure switches and I only had one weighted object to place on them. The other switch I had to keep pressed with stasis and then run through the open gate before it closed again.

The next puzzle had another tilty block but this one was about lighting lamps while also avoiding the water pumps extinguishing them. Kinda tricky, kinda taxing, kinda annoying, but I managed to get them all lit and open the door. I had to use the metal treasure chest that was on a wooden shelf high above the puzzle to keep a switch pressed down so one of the water pumps was out of the way. I used stasis on the other water pump and tilted the best I could to light all the lamps.

To be honest, I was relying on luck to keep the torches tilted away from that remaining water pump! I'm glad I didn't have much trouble because I didn't have a lot of confidence in the tilting.

I met the monk and that was that for this place.

367 zelda breath of the wild - enduring the heat test with the gorons

Dear Readers,

I went back to the Gorons training at Gerudo Canyon. I took on their challenge and stood with them in the heat while wearing the desert voe gear. It didn't affect me at all! I was surprised to see these Gorons not being able to handle this level of heat. One by one they flopped and dropped out. It was very funny and it played this cute music while the trial was going on.

It was strange to me because I thought Gorons were just naturally built for the heat. I didn't know they had to train for it.

There was a second part to this challenge where I had to stand in even greater heat. I wasn't allowed to wear the fireproof armour so I had to bring out the fireproof elixir instead. I didn't think I needed it anymore but I was wrong. I won't sell all my fireproof lizards yet.

I only needed a couple of minutes and I passed the test. This made a shrine burst out of the ground, which impressed the Gorons greatly. All that was left was to go into this place, Joloo Nah Shrine.

366 zelda breath of the wild - meeting the gorons training in gerudo canyon

Dear Readers,

During the last sidequest, I spotted what looked like a massive weird cooking pan up on the cliffs of Gerudo Canyon. After a brief scrap with a silver lizalfos at a camp on the other side of the canyon, I went over to investigate.

Standing before me were a group of Gorons, looking like they meant business. They wanted to build up their tolerance to heat, as they felt it was too hot for them up on Death Mountain. They offered to let me join them and I said yes to get the quest registered, but I ducked out of it right away as my health was too low after having that fight with the silver lizalfos earlier.

I'll come back later to do the quest when I'm at full health. It's a shrine quest too.

365 zelda breath of the wild - saving sesami's friends

Dear Readers,

While at the Gerudo Canyon stable, there was a man who wanted help rescuing his friends. His name was Sesami and his friends' names were Oliff, Flaxel, Canolo and Palme. I found this pretty amusing as it seems they were all named after different types of oils found in food!

This quest also gave me the chance to explore all those weird wooden walkways and scaffolding all around the canyon every time I pass through here. I found the part of the walkway that reaches the ground in the canyon and made my way upwards, bashing bokoblins as I went. I was finally able to tell where the calls of distress and bokoblin grunts were coming from as I rescued each and every one of the friends along the walkways.

They all thanked me and headed back to Sesami at the stable. When I went back to them, it was nice to see them all together and all caught up. They forgave Sesami as well. After all, he was able to call me for help!

364 zelda breath of the wild - giving the gerudo canyon stable man his rushrooms

Dear Readers,

I had this side quest outstanding for a while but I finally decided to finish it.

I left it for ages because the man at the Gerudo Canyon stable wanted 55 rushrooms. I didn't have many and I felt they were scarce so I held off.

That was until now. I've seen many of them since and I don't have much more than 55, but I'm confident I can find loads more very quickly if I need to. I gave him what he wanted and he left a diamond in the treasure chest behind the stable. He offered to give me more if I keep giving him rushrooms in bunches of 55.

363 zelda breath of the wild - a drink for pokki at misae suma shrine

Dear Readers,

While I was hiking to the ruins, I spotted a shrine in the distance. After my business at the ruins was done I hiked happily to this newly discovered shrine, thinking it was going to be straightforward.

When I got there, I spotted a Gerudo slumped over the access panel face down, bum up, blocking me from getting in. She didn't raise her head at all when I spoke to her since she was exhausted from the thirst. She said she was glad to discover the shrine, but she was exhausted now and wasn't able to move. She longed to have her favourite drink again and she felt she was done for.

I was impressed that she didn't seem to have any fear in her at all.

I warped to Gerudo Town and told the lady running the canteen about Pokki. She knew just what to do and asked me to bring ice from the icehouse to the entrance of the northern ruins.

I went to the icehouse, explained the situation to the Gerudo there and got a big ice block to carry. I had to carry it back in time before it melted.

I had to deal with the heat so I dodged it between shadows in the ruins. It was full of enemies as well so I wore the Lizalfos mask and made sure the Bokoblins couldn't see me.

I got to the canteen lady with the ice block. She was surprised that I wasn't a vai but she didn't really care as long as she got her ice. She told me to tell Pokki that she was going to make a special drink just for her and that it was waiting for her.

I took a sand seal back to Pokki and told her this. She became very energetic and excited, thinking it was a very special occasion and that this was going to be the best drink she ever had. She legged it back to town, leaving me with the shrine, finally.

There was no puzzle inside, just like the previous one at the ruins. Helping Pokki was good enough to give me access to the monk.

362 zelda breath of the wild - unlocking korsh o'hu shrine at the east gerudo ruins

Dear Readers,

I went to the ruins and beheld all the tall statues. There were these holes at the foot of each of them and I had to place these metal balls in them that matched the patterns of the ones on the statues.

Some of the metal balls were just lying around and half-buried and some were way up high on the statues themselves. Similar story with the patterns of the statues. Some were on the swords and some were on the feet or the head of the statues themselves. It wasn't too difficult to figure out. It really had the feel of something that was just abandoned rather than stuff that was hidden.

One of the statues had scaffolding that led all the way up to the head and that helped a lot with jumping and gliding between them.

I sussed all the answers by looking at the patterns and placed the balls in the holes accordingly. The last one was just out of pure elimination as I didn't see its clue.

A shrine burst out of the ground in the centre of the ruins and I went inside. I didn't have to do anything else so I got to the monk straight away.

361 zelda breath of the wild - stopping the ball at kema zoos shrine

Dear Readers,

There wasn't much to this place. I just had to bring down the electric ball that was being tossed back and forth by two columns. I used Stasis and that helped bring the ball down. From then on it was just a matter of using Magnesis on the ball to carry it to activate the power points in order to open cages to the treasure and to the monk.

360 zelda breath of the wild - navigating the silent swordswomen

Dear Readers,

One of the Gerudo Town guards told me about the statues of the swordswomen and how they pointed towards a treasure. This was a good while ago and it came up as a shrine quest. I'm a lot better equipped for the desert now so I decided to go where they were pointing.

I went through a dense sandstorm but kept going as best as I could. I couldn't use my Sheikah Slate map but I was fortunate enough to keep finding more swordswomen statues. I kept going in the directions they were pointing and eventually I came across Kema Zoos shrine.

359 zelda breath of the wild - hunting moldugas for the first time

Dear Readers,

I thought it was about time to hunt down a Molduga. A Gerudo in town wanted some of its guts to use in medicine for her husband and Kilton wanted me to beat some of them up, so I got to it. I ventured west from Gerudo Town and found one burrowing around some rocky mounds I was able to use for safety.

I took out my round bombs and rolled them towards the Molduga whenever it came near me. Detonating them made the Molduga burst out of the ground and flop on its side, dazed. After that it was just a matter of whacking it with weapons to get its health down.

I had some annoying distractions like Lizalfos and Stalizalfos, and I got tossed around several times by the big creature, but I managed to slay the beast. I got the remains I wanted and headed back to town.

The Gerudo with the unwell husband was very happy with the Molduga guts I got for her. I also feel a bit more confident in dealing with Molduga now.

358 zelda breath of the wild - firing the cannon at bareeda naag shrine

Dear Readers,

Bareeda Naag shrine was a simple one puzzle shrine. I had to use the cannons to shoot at a target in order to open the way to the monk. There were objects in the way but I was able to use stasis to make one thing stay in place for a while. There was another cannon I could use to get at a treasure chest.

357 zelda breath of the wild - the heart-shaped hole in rito village pillar

Dear Readers,

I forgot to mention this one. There was a song that one of the Rito was singing and I needed to speak to another Rito to complete it. The second one wouldn't finish it for me until I answered memory questions about the first part.

So I did a little bit of memorisation and answered the multiple choice questions correctly. She was happy to give me the second part of the song then.

The Sheikah slate remembers the song in full in the quest update. I won't have to remember it anymore.

The song referred to a spot in the area surrounding Rito Village where the sun shines through a heart-shaped hole in the giant stone pillar above the village at noon. I spent a night in this hole with a campfire and woke at noon to see where the light landed. It was on a Shrine platform to the south. I glided over there and had to spend another night by a campfire on it to make it light up again at noon. After that I relit the campfire and that made the shrine come out of the ground. This was Bareeda Naag shrine.

356 zelda breath of the wild - beating up igneo talus for a quest

Dear Readers,

After the shrine, I used a couple of Revali's updraughts so I could reach the lava lake shore. I headed to the spot where the igneo talus was.

Luckily I happened to have a great frost blade! The opposite of when I was fighting a frost talus with a great flame blade!

However, I had a much harder time here. I kept getting pounded by the igneo talus. I had enough supplies for recovery but it was a very clumsy battle for me. I really get the feeling that going close quarters is not the way to fight these guys because it just feels so clumsy to stun it and then climb up on it and stay climbed up on it to batter its weak point.

Anyway, I eventually defeated it and the quest was done. I reported back and took a trip to the hot springs as well.

Fugo wanted me to sell the claim to victory to him for 100 rupees. Initially I was against it, but there wasn't any other option really so I agreed to it anyway. It made him happy but also vaguely unsure of himself since he didn't do it himself. A Goron should be able to handle something like this no problem. A Goron could literally eat the talus anyway since they eat rocks? Why not.

355 zelda breath of the wild - carrying blue flame at shorah hah shrine

Dear Readers,

I had a couple of quests I needed to do for the Gorons, so I warped to Goron City.

I took the long rail that wraps around the big lava lake to the north in order to get to the quest I wanted to do quickly, but when I got to the end of the rail there was a shrine! I thought hmm... it might be a difficult one since it was so easy to get to.

It was a fairly detailed shrine, but not too difficult. What I had to do was light lamps with a blue flame in order to clear obstacles on the way to the monk. Some of these were straight forward — just carry a torch to each lamp.

Then there were tricky ones where I had to hold an arrow up to a flame and shoot at unlit lamps in the distance. That caught me out before! Not this time!

Then there were these pumps shooting out water. I had to manoeuvre around them when they were flowing. I had to use stasis on the pumps a couple of times to stop the water so I could carry a blue flame through safely. Sometimes the pumps would shoot out a tiny bit of water to put out a flame, as if to mock my efforts! It was all very simple to figure out and it was just a thing to manage.

A few moments of excitement too where I got to beat up guardian scouts. That was fun.

The last puzzle was where I was surrounded with lamps and pumps. I had to do a spin attack with a lit torch to light all the lamps at once before any water could get out at them. After this, the way opened to the monk. Another nice little puzzle.

354 zelda breath of the wild - solving and conquering mozo shenno shrine

Dear Readers,

A little Rito told me a story about her granddad flying up to the lone tree on the mountain in the distance. She said he saw a big white bird and went after it. He saw something golden in its belly. This came up as a shrine quest and I went to check it out for myself.

I climbed up to the tree, but saw no bird except for an islander hawk. Then I saw a little snow pattern in the distance. On the ground there was what looked like the shape of a huge bird's wing. It seemed like this wasn't a literal creature but something that looked like one. I glided in that direction and as I got closer I could see a hole in the cliff under the bird pattern. In this hole was the golden gleam of a shrine! Woo!

It was all tucked away in there all snug! I went inside and it was another major test of strength. I went full force with my weapons, occasionally dodging for a flurry rush and I beat it in no time. Very nice little puzzle of a quest.

353 zelda breath of the wild - princess zelda is in love with me!

Dear Readers,

Kass asked me to meet him for a sing song when he daughters went to bed, so I met him in the evening near the shrine in Rito Village.

He told me about his music teacher, who used to be at the castle. He fell in love with Princess Zelda's beauty but was still very duty bound and the love was very much unrequited. He said Zelda only had eyes for the knight who was assigned to protect her, and her love for him awakened her powers at Fort Hateno. He witnessed all this and it inspired him to write a song about the hero who had fallen but was going to come back to regain his power. It was a nice little song about who I am and what I'm doing in this game as my main objective. 

There's all the tender moments and chemistry, but here it is confirmed that she was in love with me and it was what helped her powers come forth. What a wonderful thing!

352 zelda breath of the wild - beating up the frost talus for a mission

Dear Readers,

A sidequest from one of the Rito was about beating up a specific Frost Talus. I met it before so I warped up to the mountains and glided down to it.

I just happened to have a great flame blade so I was able to thaw its frostiness. I managed to get it into a position where I was able to whack it until it was defeated as well. I was very lucky as I'm usually not great at fighting these.

I got a nice little reward when I got back to the village.

351 zelda breath of the wild - voo lota shrine feels like a prank

Dear Readers,

I was a bit surprised that this shrine didn't give me the orb straight away, seeing how it took a detailed quest for me to gain access to it, but that's okay. Instead of the monk, I was faced with a really tall ladder.

It took a while to climb this ladder. I was half expecting a voice to sing "Snake Eater" while I was climbing.

When I got to the top, there was a switch. I hit the switch and the floor gave away, plunging me into lava! I was too surprised to react. I'm just glad I respawned at the switch.

I dropped and glided down to the main area. It was all a suspended winding path with fans above a huge pool of lava. I had to navigate this path and use the fans to glide to the next part of the path. I had to navigate around obstacles in the air that got in the way too.

Eventually I got a key from a chest and I collected the rest of the treasure before I got to unlock the door to the monk.

350 zelda breath of the wild - revealing the shrine with song at warbler's nest

Dear Readers,

I decided to go all the way to Rito Village for the next quest. One of the bird moms was worried about one of her little ones going to Warbler's Nest on her own, and I agreed to check on her.

When I got there, she was fine, but she was annoyed at her sisters who didn't come to practise singing with her. I went back to let the mother know, and then I went to find her sisters.

One of them wanted to eat a very specific salmon dish and the rest of them were out finding ingredients. I found them at the shop for the butter, at the pond outside the village for the fish, and on the rocks high above the village for the wheat. I warped to Vah Medoh for that last one.

I took all the ingredients to the cooking pot and made the salmon dish before giving it to the sister that wanted to eat. After this, I found them all at Warbler's Nest practising their singing.

They sang a song in a specific order and it seemed like their position corresponded to the numbers on the pillars in the area. It was easy to see what the order was after a few listens to the song and I used the Korok leaf they gave me to make sounds in the pillar holes. I got it right and a shrine burst out of the ground. They were all very impressed with it.

I went into the shrine. Unfortunately, I still had an extra task to do inside. I'll detail it next time. When I finished, I went back to the village and Kass was playing music with them! They sang the tune of the village and it sounded really nice.

349 zelda breath of the wild - searching for sunken treasure in the sea

Dear Readers,

An old man at Lurelin Village tasked me with finding sunken treasure, so I went out on the raft to find it. He said it was in the middle of a golden triangle.

It was a bit hard to find a golden triangle on the map, but when I got out to sea I could see three rocks that made the points of a triangle. I turned Magnesis on and there were a few chests in the middle of them.

I don't recall the chests having anything special in them, but the quest was now done!

That was a relief to get done, because sailing the raft isn't very fun at all in this game. It's novel, but it gets awkward and tiresome quickly. There's a knack to getting the raft to sail very fast, but you really need a straight line of water without any obstacles. Having to deal with Octoroks is a big pain as well.

348 zelda breath of the wild - taking back the sea at lurelin village

Dear Readers,

I went to Lurelin Village to do the quests down at the beach I had yet to do.

The first one was to clear the enemies out from Aris Beach. They had taken over the place and had tall campsites and lookout posts sticking out from the water. I was too timid to do it before but I was well able now.

They were all Bokoblins! Very weak ones too. Even if they weren't weak, I was able to just knock them into the water with a heavy weapon. Together with the Bokoblin mask I was unstoppable. I beat up every single one of them easily and the quest was completed in no time.

347 zelda breath of the wild - upgrading equipment slots with hestu

Dear Readers,

I finally decided to speak to Hestu and increase my equipment inventory. I had over 100 Korok seeds at this point but never upgraded.

I trotted out to Kakariko Village and chatted with him. He gave me a few item slots before saying he had to go home to Korok Forest. I guess I'll have to go there to do more upgrading. It doesn't make a lot of sense but I'll warp there to see him sometime.

346 zelda breath of the wild - salvaging treasure at riverside stable

Dear Readers,

I decided to go treasure hunting in the area around Riverside Stable. I turned on the radar to find chests in the area. Most of them were in the fast moving river nearby.

I couldn't reach any of the chests with magnesis from the bank, so I had to chop down some trees so I could obtain a korok leaf.

Going on the raft and using a leaf to put wind in the sail is a novel idea, but it's a pain to have to do it for a while. It's an even bigger pain to go against the current, which I had to do sometimes. On top of that, I had to deal with octoroks shooting at me from the river and from the trees on the opposite bank.

It was very tricky to line up with chests to pull them out of the water while moving with the current, but I managed to do it. It made me long for the salvaging mechanic from Wind Waker and Phantom Hourglass. From the chests were rupees, arrows, weapons, all kinds of bits and pieces.

I took treasure from nearby ruins as well as this one bokoblin camp that didn't have easy access. I used Revali's up draught thingy in order to access it.

345 zelda breath of the wild - giving cake to the guy at riverside stable who wanted royal food

Dear Readers,

I decided to give some food to the guy at Riverside Stable who dreamed of eating the food that was detailed in recipe books at Hyrule Castle library.

However, when I was at the castle, I could only find the monster cake recipe. This was a disappointment for me as I thought there was a treasure of knowledge in there. Also, the old lady at Tarrey Town already knew that recipe. I didn't know it off the top of my head so I warped there to talk to her.

Wheat, sugar cane, butter and monster extract were what I needed. I cooked it there and then. I also used the goddess statue to max out my stamina wheels. From now on, those orbs will be going towards hearts!

I warped back to Riverside Stable and the guy was very happy with his monster cake. Quest done! It was one I was holding on to for a long long while.

344 zelda breath of the wild - sand seal racing at raqa zunzo shrine

Dear Readers,

I tried out the sand seal racing thing that was happening now that the divine beast wasn't rampaging anymore.

It turns out it wasn't a competitive race against other racers but a time trial with a record to beat. The prize was a shrine orb.

The race itself was pretty easy. I just had to navigate around rocks and enemies and go through gates as best as I could.

I beat the best time by just a few seconds and got the orb. The Gerudos were stunned when I made the shrine pop out of the ground. It wouldn't happen with anyone else apparently.

The previous record holder was a strong but silent type. She seemed cool. She warmed up to me once I achieved a good record. She was excited to try and beat my new time too.

I went into the newly sprouted Raqa Zunzo shrine and it was all I needed to do to get to the monk.

I'll be able to make money here if I try to beat my time again but I don't know if I will yet.

343 zelda breath of the wild - puntastic current solution in hawa koth shrine

Dear Readers,

Nice pun on this shrine because it involved electric currents. I went from room to room connecting power thingies with action thingies that made doors open. Cogs were also turning to open doors too so that was nice.

Some switches made the floor turn sideways so you'd fall into the water.

There was also a nifty puzzle near the end where you had to shift columns of blocks by pressing a switch and make the electronic parts align up. I got stuck on it for a while until I realised that the columns could be separated into individual blocks. After that I was able to slip another block in the way so the circuit would get going.

Nice weak guardian scouts here I was able to smash up easily too.

342 zelda breath of the wild - looking for the great fairy in the desert

Dear Readers,

I recall from looking up guides that there was a great fairy in Gerudo Desert, so I set off to find her.

I warped to Gerudo Town and took a sand seal out to go exploring the areas to the south of the town. It was my first time going down here.

I thought maybe she was at the southern oasis, but the only thing I found there was a very troublesome Molduga, which tossed me in the air a few times. I haven't learned how to fight them yet.

I found the fairy eventually by going towards the bottom left corner of the map. There was a huge skeleton there and within that were the great fairy and another shrine.

The great fairy wanted 10,000 rupees to come out of her shell. That's gonna take a while... I'm glad I found her at least.

341 zelda breath of the wild - red giveaway at shada naw shrine

Dear Readers,

A tricky puzzley shrine where you have to land an orb into its hole while standing on a platform you raise with it. There were fans and platforms and everything. The nice thing about this one is that you could develop your own way of getting the ball into the hole.

It seemed intentional for you to use the fans and stasis on the moving platform and magnesis on the metal crate to put it on the hidden platform. However, I simply stood on the platform and used stasis on the ball to knock into a very specific location on the ramp so it would roll down into the hole.

The top of the platform leads to the monk.

340 zelda breath of the wild - power of reach at rok uwog shrine

Dear Readers,

I'm doing a bunch of shrines together. I discovered a string of them together without doing them and now I'm catching up.

This shrine had a few rooms with leaves and weak guardian scouts. I assume the power of reach was all about using the drillshaft I found here to smash some boxes that were sitting on a switch. Once I did, the way opened to the monk.