Puzzling Picnic

MY LATEST FAVORITE CROSSWORD CLUE

I continue to take great delight in cryptic crossword discoveries.

I had to share this one from yesterday with you.

The clue 

The clue was 7 down:  "Not slowed down by the totally unprepared picnickers?"

Although we looked at this clue early on we could not figure it out and it ended up being almost the last one solved.  We needed the helping letters in place to give us enough clues. 

So what was our thinking?

We knew that we were going to find something unusual (and possibly have a laugh) because of the question mark on the end. That usually indicates something a bit funny or twisted in the thinking. 

Not slowed down

The "not slowed down" had us thinking fast, speedy, etc. 

Un

Eventually we had the n as the second letter and realized we were probably looking for Un something

Not

Then we started to think about the not on the front. 

I got stuck on unimpeded and didn't seem to be able to get it out of my head....

And a touch of inspiration from Trev 

And then suddenly Trev had it  in a burst of inspiration and we laughed till we stopped.

The answer

Of COURSE!   Unhampered!!!

They were surely unprepared picnickers if they had no hamper  :)

I still get such a kick out of solving a clue like this. I love sharing the surprise of the answer together and having a laugh at the simple treasure hidden by the creator of the puzzle..