For our recent trip to Reno, since we were going to be there for four nights and there was no way we could afford to gamble all that time, I looked for other things that we could do. I got us tickets to see the Reno Aces play the Sacramento Rivercats (the San Francisco AAA baseball team) for one of their night games and we were going to see a friend of ours play in a softball game as well. I wanted to do something else and I remembered that I had gotten us a Big City Hunt Scavenger Hunt to do in San Francisco but we hadn’t had a chance to do it yet. I looked to see if they had one in Reno and sure enough they did, and they were having a sale so it was only $22 for the two of us. I figured it was a good way for me to incorporate some exercise into our trip since I was giving myself permission to relax a bit on my healthy eating program. The Scavenger Hunt is a walking tour but it is self-directed so I knew we could take our time and not be under any pressure.
I must admit we did not begin very well as I started us off in the wrong direction. Much to my husband’s credit, he did not get too upset or give up on the excursion just because of that. I did get to take a few cool pictures:
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| Good luck message to start the walk. |
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| Huge butterfly. |
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| Stars on a star |
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| Some kind of accident happened here! |
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| Looks like an ice castle. |
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| Love this winged horse. |
After I got us back on track, we started the actual hunt. Our first stop was at a park that had a large mural on the wall. The question we were asked was about one of the figures depicted on the wall.
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| I love this mystic Indian |
Just in case you decide to take this hunt, I’m not going to give away the answers or tell all the specific locations…
Next was an outdoor amphitheater and then came a church. My husband went around the side to see if we could actually enter the church and got some pictures for me.
It was a beautiful day and we tried to walk on the shady side of the street as much as possible because it was afternoon and the heat sometimes affects my husband.
After the church, we were led to a sports bar. Perfect timing to wet our whistles! Along the way we ran into this antique shop. We could definitely have spent all day in this place! So many cool things!
This old typewriter was one of my favorites.
We felt right at home at this sports bar!
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| Definitely a San Francisco sports fan! |
Interestingly, the bartender did not know that the bar was part of the scavenger hunt. We told him about it in case they got credit for people who make it there, but since he never heard of it, I guess that’s not part of the game. Still, as I said, we felt right at home!
Next was a walk over the bridge to the other side of town. The river was quite high thanks to the good rain we had.
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| Some beautiful clouds in the sky! |
It’s hard to tell from the picture but there is a waterfall across the front of that building. Very neat.
Next stop was to a structure in the middle of the city. We came upon it from the side so I could not see what it really was until we got right in front of it:
This deserves its own blog post since it is my word of the year. Stay tuned for that.
Fittingly, since it was Memorial Day, the next stop was a Veterans Memorial:
it was a very moving tribute to all branches of the Armed Services.
We could have stopped at this point but there was one more place on the hunt so we decided to continue.
My husband asked if I wanted to go inside but I figured I had put him through enough already so I said no. Next time I may make that a spot to visit. When we submitted our final points for the Hunt, we were in about 4th place but we didn’t submit pictures along the way and we took our time. Submitting pictures and speed could get you more points, but it wasn’t really about that for us.
On the way home we found some more interesting things to look at. I think my husband would have done very well at this sandbag toss if I hadn’t tired him out with all the walking!
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| This is called The Eddy and has lots of different games to play. |
We made it back to the hotel and were not too worse for wear. Later in the evening we were walking outside and I saw the statues I had taken in the beginning all lit up:
I should have crossed the street to get the “ice castle” closer but I didn’t.
All in all we had a great time in Reno (even if we didn’t win any money gambling). I would definitely recommend the
Big City Hunt if you have time on your next getaway, or even if you just want a fun thing to do on a day off in your home town. My husband and I did it by ourselves but you could get a whole group together and try it that way. You can set roles too, tour director and photographer were what we chose, but if you have more people you can have more roles. I am looking forward to doing the one in San Francisco. Bonus, we can do it in the middle of the week so it shouldn’t be as crowded.
Have you ever done a Scavenger Hunt like this? Won big in Reno? Love to hear about it.
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