Emily asked me to do the two-person team, 24-hour, scavenger hunt bike race while I was still in Africa. It sounded intriguing; I agreed. Neither of us could have anticipated how much fun it would be.
We began the race at 3 pm on Saturday at South Park. The organizer, Mike, passed out manifests, a book of 138 items to either photograph, obtain a rubbing, collect an item, or write down answers for. Some clues were easy, others obtuse. We started downtown, snapping photos by the water, making rubbings of historical dates and sculptors, collecting business cards from businesses on certain streets, gradually moving to Fisherman’s Wharf where we played skeeball (somewhat successfully), DDR (not at all successfully), and searching for the Bushman (his day was done).
We continued searching for clues and taking photos till about 1 am, when we biked over to Emily’s house to start on the items we had classified as “home.” Find an expired passport, collect a tooth, make a stuffed animal, build a three-story house of cards. We worked until we realized the sun was rising. We looked at each other and started laughing. “Let’s get one hour of sleep then we’ll start again.”
Which we did. There was no way we could have completed all 138 items, but we didn’t realize that. Until the very last moment we were attempting to complete tasks. We didn’t do bad. We collected over 777 points. Much more than most of the teams and a little less than a few. We’re already strategizing about the next race. Bring a laptop, mapquest the route, and pivot table the hell out of the clues. We’re so coming in first next time.
LoriLoo 