Pittsburgh Urban Dare 2011

We did Urban Dare in Pittsburgh, again this year – on Saturday April 26th. Urban Dare is sort of like the tv show Amazing Race, but limited to a few hours on foot. It is a scavenger hunt in which you have to figure out what different clues mean and then go to that location to either complete a task or take a picture of yourself to show you were there. Last year we had a lot of fun, running around downtown Pittsburgh. But we made a tactical error in figuring out clues while moving around (with much help from Tim’s brother Matt, via phone), and so the route we took included some back-tracking.

This year we decided to figure out most or all of the clues before leaving the start location, the Claddagh Irish Pub in the South Side Works. Thanks to a long line of people checking in, the race didn’t start until ~15 minutes after the planned start time of noon. First there was a costume competition, decided by cheering – which was won by sisters dressed as bacon and eggs, although a duo dressed like Cobra ninjas (from GIJoe) seemed to have more support.

Then, the race was on – we got the clue sheet and started googling with our phones. And, Tim took a picture with his phone and emailed it to his brother. After about 10 minutes we had figured out eight of the eleven clues, and set off. We figured the others had to be somewhere in the middle, since several clues had us walking pretty far up to the Pitt campus.

Stop 1: One clue we were unsure about, but found when we walked to the Hot Metal Bridge was the solution to: “#10 Since we are in steel city, go to the steelworker monument for your wheelbarrow dare.” This of course, led to the Steelworkers Monument, which we have walked by before. Janie was the wheelbarrow and Tim lifted her legs while we went around a ~10-foot loop.

Stop 2: Then we crossed the Hot Metal Bridge to the other side of the Monongahela river. Back at the start, while we were figuring out the clues, the team next to us said this answer loudly, which was hard to not hear. “#8: Go to the park overlooking the river next to (a device for establishing a horizontal plane. It consists of a small glass tube containing alcohol or similar liquid and an air bubble.) (LI DIVIDED BY XVII) for your 3-legged dare.” Well, this meant Level (3) – a company right across the bridge, by the river. When we got there, it was a different dare: blow a bubble with a big chunk of bubble gum. The challenge was that the gum was in a pile of whipped cream….which didn’t make it too hard to find, but it was hard to chew and blow a bubble as the cream made the gum disintegrate at first. But, eventually Tim got a bubble, small as it was.

Stop 3: Next, we started up the hill on Bates road towards the Pitt campus. It was a long, steep hill that we sure felt the next day. While going up, Tim was talking with his brother Matt, about one of the clues. We noticed some other racers taking their picture by a restaurant. When we got there, it turned out to be the answer to the question we were talking about. “#7: Nobody knew who Mel Gibson was until he appeared in this 1979 movie. If this picture were shot in Tijuana instead of Australia, maybe it would have been called this. Get your picture in front of the restaurant with this name.” We knew he did “Tim” and “Mad Max” in 1979…and seeing this restaurant made it clear what the answer was: “Mad Mex!”

Stop 4: We then continued towards the next stop, which was an easy one. “#2: The field is no longer there, but part of the outfield wall remains. Bill Mazeroski hit a home run over this wall to win the World Series in 1960. Go to there for your spellbound dare.” This was easy – the old Forbes Field adjacent to the Pitt campus. On our Urban Dare passport was the word Neanderthal. We had to find each letter in the word on little signs on the ground and add up the numbers assigned to each. Janie and Tim each got a sum of 130, which was somehow incorrect (no way!) but we were given a clue and got the “correct” answer of 140 to complete the challenge.

Stop 5: Then we continued, further into the Pitt campus. “#6: He won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1954. Get your picture in front of the cafe that goes by his name.” Janie found this: Ernest Hemingway, leading to the “Hemingway’s Cafe” on Forbes Avenue.

Stop 6: In this one, we knew what to look for but weren’t sure where it was. Matt had found a picture online, but it wasn’t clear where it was. Tim looked at the picture, which suggested a certain area of campus – and based on what it was, we thought it might be at the Soldiers & Sailors Museum. Leaving Hemingway’s, several other teams were going in that direction, so we followed them. And, we found the answer to “#11: Get your picture with a WWII torpedo” which was indeed in front of the Museum, and familiar to Tim when recalling a trip there when his parents were in town. Also there were a TON of people for the graduation ceremony that apparently had just ended inside. They were all milling around, taking pictures of each other. And there we were, and a few other teams, slipping through to the torpedo and out. ha!

Stop 7: The next one was easy, as Tim has eaten here several times. “#9: Get your picture with a neon sign that says Free Smells.” Of course, this meant Jimmy John’s, which is near Tim’s building on the Pitt campus. We went there for our last planned stop near campus.

Stop 8: As we headed back towards the South Side, we knew we still had to do the “Photo Hunt” – getting people not in the race to pose for us. While walking, we saw two groups of people that were perfect.

First, these three were good sports about posing for “#4: Get a picture of 3 people doing see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil.” The one on the left commented “I’m a little hungover, so you’ll have to help us.” Ha.

As we continued walking, Janie noticed a couple behind us who might have been perfect for the other clue: “#4: Get a picture of 2 people not in the race reenacting the famous WWII photo by Alfred Eisenstaedt.” Well, this was the iconic picture of a sailor kissing a nurse during the celebration in Times Square on V-J Day. This couple was willing to oblige, especially as they had already posed several times for other teams!

Stop 9: After crossing back over the Hot Metal Bridge, we were on the homestretch. We headed over to the next stop, the solution to “#3: If you can’t run with these, stay on the porch. Get your picture in front of the coffee house that goes by this name.” Janie figured this meant running with the ‘big dogs’ and we found the “Big Dog Coffee” place.

Stop 10: Further west was our next stop, the solution to: “#1: Jack Nicholson won the Academy Award for Best Actor in this 1975 film. Get your picture with the magic shop that has part of this film’s title in its name.” Janie found that the movie was One flew over the cuckoo’s nest, which led us to “The Cuckoo’s Nest Magic Shop.”

Stop 11: Finally, our last stop, just a few blocks away. “#5: He defeated Muhammad Ali in the fight of the century. Get your picture in front of the saloon that goes by his nickname.” Well, Joe Frazier beat Ali in that fight, and Frazier’s nickname was Smokin Joe. That led us to “Smokin’ Joe’s Saloon” on Carson Street.

And with that, we were done and just had to head back to the start and check in. They stamped our time as 2:09:38. As the race started after noon, we figure that we did it in under 2hours. According to Tim’s GPS watch, we covered 5.75 miles in 1 hour 38 minutes of walking (started timer after figuring out clues). According to the email Urban Dare sent out today, we finished 79^th out of 264 teams – top 30%! That beat Tim’s goal of finishing in the top half. Pretty good for walking the whole thing (many teams were jogging). Here is the map of our route, showing each stop.

[Well, I want to put a map in…we’ll see. My Garmin watch is acting up — the route isn’t showing up on my laptop any more and it isn’t syncing. Hmmm. Weird. Hope I don’t have to re-create it by hand.]

We sure had a blast doing this! We are talking about doing the Dare in Columbus, Ohio in June and are looking forward to its return to Pittsburgh next year.