Saturday, December 5, 2015

Gray Friday scavenger hunt

We're in (and out of and then back in) California for a little while (exact amount of time TBD).  Already we have done 2 fun races - love the variety of options in the Bay Area!

First was the Terraloco TrailCross "map adventure" at Bayfront Park, a fun 10K crisscrossing a small area on and off the trail network across open fields and up and down little hills.  We had 4 maps that visited 10 controls in different combinations and there was a mass start which is always fun.  We watched John take off and leave everyone, nice job for the win.  Kip stayed ahead of me, sometimes within sight but moving too quickly for me to catch.  What a lung-buster, still needing to think to plan routes and take efficient lines.  Excellent, sunny day!  Too fast for photos, that one was.

The next event was a new one for us, SF Games and Scavenger Hunts.  Shuai put together an interesting and fun course around the Mission District, highlighting reuse and thrift stores to celebrate "Gray Friday" as an alternative to Black Friday.  We went into it not really knowing what to expect, quickly figuring out that we needed to sit down somewhere and get solving on the 25 clues plus a couple bonuses.  Coffee shop it is!

Something new for us, solving our own clues  :)  We split them up and got working on everything with our phones plus Kip's small laptop.  My first two answers were right next door to where we were sitting, let's go right now!  OK, calm down, let's map everything out first.  I started sticking "stars" on Google Maps on my phone.  Solvers and mappers, I guess we're going to be our own phone contacts too.  Funny!

We finished up some final details, thanked the coffee shop lady, and started moving.  Here's an assortment of the better photos, just for fun.

The manager of Retro Fit Vintage was happy to pose with us:


Working to verify exactly what to take a picture of at each spot, each of us was responsible for 1/3 of the checkpoints (and we were glad we had decided to team up for this one instead of trying it solo!):


A bonus point for getting a picture of one of us in a laundry cart - Kip wasn't sure what these carts would look like, but John and I have used a few of them over the years:


John figured out the next day how to change the settings on his phone to show the actual image instead of the mirror version that it saved here:


It was fun playing with the front camera to see what we were actually taking a picture of:


Lots going on, trying not to miss anything as we fly through the close checkpoints:


Yay for libraries!


Working our way down the busy 24th Street:


More fun looking for artwork inside the stores:


Checking out Modern Times Books:


Just in case you can't read this, it says "Women are perfect":


Murals on a street called Balmy Alley; we didn't know about these, we should come back and check them out sometime:


A place called Urban Putt looks really popular based on the line outside, could be cool:


Planters made from recycled materials at Atlas Cafe:


The office for Burning Man, that's cool!


The Armory - an artist lives here or something?  It was John's clue so maybe he can explain:


Getting a little punchy toward the end:


The entrance to Noisebridge, a hacker space, that sounds like something else to look into:


And finally... a thrift store:


Lots of fun, including having to take apart our winner's trophy to find our prize (entry to another of these events) - awesome!  Well-written and interesting clues, great attention to detail, and a good course, we were impressed.  Also - love running around the Mission District.

Thanks for the fun, Rex and Shuai!

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