NYC is a fantastic playground. Scavenger hunts are fantastic fun. Scavenger hunts in NYC? That equals double fantastic, my friends, especially when you don't have to join a group of annoying strangers and all the clues are accessible through a smart phone. Since I have a dumb phone, S and I relied on her phone and her better ability to figure things out as we headed deep into the heart of Battery Park.
The hunt, offered through an online group that has a bunch of scavenger hunts throughout the city, is based on city landmarks and a little bit of history. It told us to do things that we were not going to do like, "Ask a New Yorker the lyrics to....." We are New Yorkers, so we asked ourselves, and when we couldn't figure it out, we asked Google. It also told us to take a picture of ourselves doing certain things and then send them into the site. We took pics but we didn't send them in. We still got points for figuring out things.
We actually did very well at the beginning. The clue would appear. We would figure out where to go and what to do. We would type in an answer. We would be showered with praise and given the next clue. It was quite ego-boosting.
Unfortunately, things started to head downhill right in the middle. We answered a question correctly and then received our next clue. We figured out where to go but when we got there, we realized we didn't know what to do. The clue had no question. It gave us a hint as to where to go, then some blank space, and then ANSWER:________.
When we'd started, S read that we could call a number if we needed help. So I called the company. I explained that we were in the middle of a scavenger hunt and we had a clue but no question. The woman responded, I don't know what you mean. So then I went through the whole thing again and I read the screen to her. She said, Ohhh, you have no question. She told me to use our hint and we would be able to answer. I thanked her. S was like, that means we lose points and it probably won't work. I shrugged and stressed that the first phone call didn't go so well (I don't know what you mean) so a second one didn't seem too hopeful.
We used our hint. Instead of helping with the question, it simply told us the destination. We were already at the destination. So then we looked around and asked ourselves, What would we ask at this destination? Seeing several statues, we typed in the name of one of the statues.
We? Are geniuses.
From there it was all sunshine and smiles again.
Until we hit another bump in the road. We made it to a destination. We actually had the question. We simply couldn't figure out how we were supposed to answer it. It told us to go to some garden and then asked how many miles it was from the garden to actual place it was named after overseas. We read everything there was to read. We looked in every crack and looked at every bench. How the heck were we supposed to know this? We asked for another hint since our perfect score was already ruined by the nonquestion, and it told us to go stand in the middle of the garden. I did that. I looked at the stone it said to stand on, thinking it had the miles on it. Nope. Nothing. Was I supposed to be like, Let me whip out my mileometer to figure it out? Were we really supposed to look it up? Explain yourself, scavenger hunt people! We opted to take random guesses instead of calling again. Our random guesses were incorrect. Points lost.
However, things were looking up again. The biggest redeeming quality was the discovery of a rooftop garden overlooking the water. Oh, what a view!
We completed the hunt successfully and happily, finding the last answer at the last location easily and quickly. It was slightly anti-climactic because no one is there cheering for you. We cheered for ourselves. Then we went in search of some pizza. No matter how it ended or how many snafus snagged us, we were always much more content than this guy:
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