Believe it or not: Grandpa conquered the world with a 60,000 piece jigsaw

After four years, 800 painstaking hours and one heart-stopping missing piece, a Colorado grandpa has finally snapped the last bit into place by completing what’s billed as the world’s largest commercially available jigsaw puzzle. The victory lap? Equal parts triumph, exhaustion and a very full garage. When patience meets 60,000 piecesMeet Lou Salas, who casually assembled the 60,000-piece puzzle titled What a Wonderful World by Dowdle. The puzzle arrives in 60 separate boxes (1,000 pieces each), which Salas methodically completes in his puzzle room, storing finished sections on thick plastic sheets. Along the way, he got assistance from his 8-year-old granddaughter, fondly dubbed a “puzzle prodigyThe missing puzzle piece that completed itJust when victory seemed close, disaster struck: one section was missing a single piece. Dowdle stepped in and sent the final piece, restoring the set. Friends and family built an 8-foot-by-29.5-foot Styrofoam table in his garage. Salas literally suspended himself from the ceiling to place the pieces. The final assembly took ninehours and occupied his entire three-car garage.