Pokémon Let's Go Vermilion City and Lt. Surge Gym puzzle solution - available Pokémon, items and trainers

Vermilion City and the Lt. Surge Gym battle are your next stops after Route 6, but you'll need to do a couple of things - including finding the Vermilion City Gym puzzle solution first if you want to progress.

Below, we'll cover any and all of the obtainable Pokémon, item locations, trainers and their squads that you might encounter in the area, as well as walking you through any key steps of the story along the way.

We've also opted to break out walkthrough pages down into sections, referring to each of your visits to a given location, seeing as you often backtrack or revisit various places in your quest to become Champion! Where applicable, we'll split our page into one section for each visit, and of course if there are any, clearly mark any spoilers, too!

For more like this, be it specific systems explainers or walkthrough pages on more locations, head back to our main Pokémon Let's Go walkthrough and guide hub.

On this page:

Pokémon Let's Go: Vermilion City

There's lots to see and do in Vermilion City, but before we dive into that it's worth noting that, for now, the Gym is inaccessible. You'll need to learn the Secret Technique Chop Down in order to remove the tree that's blocking your path to it - you get that by heading down the S.S. Anne just to the south of town - but first, there are some things to do here.

Talk to the Police Officer - the same one you met in Cerulean City - and you'll be offered the Squirtle she was struggling with. Again, like the Bulbasaur and Charmander you receieved, this one has great stats!

Other points of interest include the Pokémon Fan Club, which houses a particularly chatty Gentleman who'll give you a new outfit if you listen to him, another Alolan Pokémon trader in the Pokémon Center, this time with an Alolan Geodude for you regular one, and a Beauty on a bench, who'll give you either an Arcanine or a Persian if you catch five of the Pokémon she asks for.

Available Pokémon

Available Items

Pokémon Let's Go: Vermilion City Gym puzzle solution and Lt. Surge Gym battle

Return to the City itself after clearing out S.S. Anne and you can finally chop down that tree to tackle Lt. Surge's Gym. He's an Electric-type master, so Ground-type Pokémon like Geodude, Onix, or Diglett (from the nearby Diglett's Cave) will work brilliantly. Otherwise, an Ivysaur, evolved from a Bulbasaur, also resists Electric-type attacks, or a Fire-type can help clear out the part Steel-type Magnemites.

The gym itself however has a puzzle to solve - and it's not the last one you'll encounter, either - but thankfully it's fairly simple.

Vermilion City Gym puzzle solution

The Vermilion City Gym is filled with what look like regular trash cans - plus a couple of coloured ones as well. All you need to do is interact with the cans to see if there's a switch in side. Flip the two switches and the electric fenches blocking Lt. Surge will be opened - but the catch is, they only both open if you flip the two switches one after the other. Accidentally interact with an empty trash can instead of one with another switch in, and the fences will reset.

If you're after a cheat sheet, then the trash cans you want to interact with are:

1. The trash can to the right of the blue trash can.
2. The trash can directly above that one.

Available Items

Trainers and Battles - Vermilion City Gym!

Once you've cleared S.S. Anne and the Vermilion City Gym, that's everything here in Vermilion City and our in-progress walkthrough itself for now, so cycle back to our main Pokémon Let's Go walkthrough and guide hub for all the other pages we have like this.