So yesterday morning Crystal and I took part in the Sachs Diamond Dash here in Worcester. The dash turned out to be a highly competitive scavenger hunt/puzzle solving game on the streets of Worcester with all clues and answers sent and received via text message.
We arrived at Institute Park at 9am to see a crowd much larger than I anticipated, but when the grand prize is a $15,000 diamond ring why would I expect a light turnout. The sun was shining brightly and we were working up a sweat just waiting in the registration line. I did get a kick out of some folks who were casually puffing on cigarettes while waiting to register, nothing like a few more smokes before competing in a race with a $15K grand prize!
Before long Konnie Lukes was announced to issue a proclamation and kick off the event. When her name was called I let out a nice, loud gutteral BOOOOO for all to hear. Very satisfying if I do say so myself.
From there the first text message was sent to everyones cellphones simultaneously, what a cacophony of sound, 400+ cellphones all going off at the same time with the first clue.
Basically the first clue sent via text would lead you to a location in Worcester, you would text back the location and the system would confirm you are correct. They would then send you a second text which would involve answering a question about that location to confirm you were actually there. I'll look back at the texts now and sort of lay out where our stops were over the 3 hours.
Start- WPI
Worcester Common
Union Station
Korean War Memorial
Federal Square
Goddard Hall at WPI
Washington Square
Old Worcester Voke
Worcester Art Museum
Worcester Aud
DCU Center
Turtle Boy Statue
As you can see we were zig-zagging all over the downtown area. We thought we did pretty well, and ended up with 149 points. Unfortunately the grand prize winners had well over 200 points and were awarded the diamond at the afterparty at Maxwell Silverman's. We did not finish in the top 8, but I have a sneaking suspicion that we ended up in the top 20.
All in all a fun event, it was great to see hundreds of people in purple t-shirts riding bikes all over downtown Worcester on a beautiful Saturday morning. I am sure we made some folks scratch their heads. And hopefully a few folks from the suburbs who came out in search of diamonds got to see that Worcester isn't that scary after all.
Sorry for the lack of photo's.... I was not going to waste time snapping pictures with a $15,000 prize on the line!
