No One Told You Life Was Gonna Be This Way

Our scavenger hunts are carefully planned out and structured, so if you’re following the directions, you should have no trouble completing the puzzles. But as much as we plan, it’s just as much fun to discover the surprises. It’s the unexpected moments that turn an activity into an adventure.

Say, for example, the time a team stumbled on the Friends couch, plopped right in the middle of Klyde Warren Park. Was it part of the hunt? No. But should they stop and take a picture with it? I mean, could it be any more obvious?

Sometimes a surprise can be an unexpected benefit. On a hunt in July, one team was delighted to have located a hidden historical marker, but as they headed back down the lawn, the sprinklers turned on, giving them all a soak. And let’s be honest, it felt fantastic. 

An occurrence that used to surprise us was the many weddings we’d encounter while hosting hunts. Eventually, we came to realize that a course that passes the gorgeous Cathedral Guadalupe is pretty likely to encounter a wedding party. In fact, one group had to wade through an entire wedding party to find their way to the next clue. Nobody had any rice to throw, so they settled for taking a picture. Since then, we’ve incorporated these happy occurrences into the hunt, and challenge players to take a photo with someone in a tuxedo. 

Other times, it’s the players who surprise us. We meet so many fascinating folks, from DFW, from Texas, and around the world, and it’s always fun to discover what people know. Take the woman who immediately knew that the answer to one question was “Charley Pride” — because he was her uncle! Or in some cases, it’s what they don’t know. We pity that poor team from Toronto who had to get a little help sorting out a clue about Tex Mex. Don’t worry, we got them fed before they went back up north.

And then you’ll be surprised at the lengths team members go to just to catch that last picture. We once witnessed a player sprint across Klyde Warren Park just in time to snap a selfie with a passing orange car. And the prompt to take a picture with a live animal has led our players to meet oh so many dogs. Because why settle for a squirrel?

If you ask us, life’s more fun when you don’t know what’s coming your way. When you’re on a scavenger hunt in Dallas, that’s pretty much guaranteed.​