Scavengeroogle: A Google Maps Scavenger Hunt To Waste More Of Your Time On

This is a really big ring. It should be fairly easy to spot… it’s so big you can see it at 9/15 magnification. I have no idea at all what this is actually. Josh’s word clue is “It might be Moroni’s halo”. Make what you will of that… and again, big giant boingy bonus points if you can tell me exactly what this thing is. Geez, this is getting to be like “What’s My Line” where Drew Carey gives out worthless points to all the contestants…

[edit: Hmm… everyone seems to be having trouble with this one. Let me throw out another “clue”: Sail South of the Salty Sea]

Clue Name : Moroni’s Halo
Submitted by: Josh H.
Status : Solved
First Solved By : Jason C., Colin P., Jeremy R., John A., Shawn D.

Word Clues : “It might be Moroni’s halo.”
Magnification Needed: 9/15
Difficulty : 4/10

SOLUTION TO “Moroni’s Halo”

OK, since the last couple of the clues were fairly difficult let’s have an easier one to start off today. Well, I say easier because this is quite viewable from far out, near 10/15 magnification. This clue was submitted by Alex who notes that it’s some “very confusing stuff”. I sort of agree, I’m pretty sure this is a big crapload of fast moving water… it looks like rapids to me, hence the clue name. But where is it all going? So, bonus points to tell me the nature of the water along with finding it on the googlemap…

Clue Name : Let’s Go Rafting
Submitted by: Alex
Status : Solved
First Solved By : Josh H., Jason C., Colin P., Jeremy R., Samuel O.

Word Clues : “McDonald’s product w/ same name as basketball team.”
Magnification Needed: 10/15
Difficulty : 3/10

SOLUTION TO “Let’s Go Rafting”

Well, this was a pretty good one. We did get five people to solve it but not all at one time. It took a little while. Incidently, I accidentally deleted the emails that said what this building with the flower on it actually was… someone said something about “Riverwalk”? Please comment if you know. I remember it was in San Antonio, TX though. Also I think Mike Z., who submitted the clue, said the flower was actually visible from another building if you climb to the top and look down.

Solution to “Yellow Rose”

Well, this was the most difficult clue to find to date. Only three people found it, and that was probably because the word clue was ambiguous on purpose. The building is actually the old Science Center in St. Louis, Missouri. As I had suspected, living nearby or knowing about the origins of the graphical clue seems to help when the word clue is really ambiguous. From Jason:

Just had a hunch and I was right, so it took me about a minute. This is the planetarium that’s part of the St. Louis Science Center. Of course I live in St. Louis.

As a separate note, there is a “swinging arm” which is also part of the Science Center that extends across the freeway that is also interesting in this location.

Solution to “Midwest Aliens”

A cool looking flower plastered on top of a building. That’s one way to bring some nature back into the urban jungle I guess. It’s not really a rose, but looks more like a daisy or something. I’m not familiar with this clue at all, but Mike says that Texans may have an easier time identifying it than people living elsewhere. His clue is: “Not quite the yellow rose of Texas”.

Clue Name : Yellow Rose
Submitted by: Mike Z.
Status : Solved
First Solved By : Frumps, Jason C., Bob N., Colin P., Wes B.

Word Clues : “Not quite the yellow rose of Texas”
Magnification Needed: 13/15
Difficulty : 4/10

SOLUTION TO “Yellow Rose”

This was a sort of fun looking feature. I’m not sure if it’s manmade or not. It’s … Minnesotan Pie! Hehe, I mean Minnesotan Pi. Yeah I’m a nerd. The magnification needed to solve this is pretty easy at 11/15 and maybe even less.

Anyhow, this word clue should be obscure enough, but then you never know. This will be pretty easy if you know what lines I’m thinking along. Well, who knows - you can probably find the darn thing without even using the word clue…

[Edit: Damn, I guess no one here really listens to indie music? OK, to move things along a bit… Chair Kick is actually “chairkickers” which refers to the band Low who live in/near… ? That’s all thee extra help ye get though… I will post up the solution by tonight regardless.]

Clue Name : Minnesotan Pie
Submitted by: Scavengeroogle Admin
Status : Solved
First Solved By : Jason C., Tina, Shawn D., A. Cooper

Word Clues : “Chair Kick”
Magnification Needed: 11/15
Difficulty : 5/10

SOLUTION TO “Minnesota Pie”

Ok, this was cool… the solution took about the amount of time that I thought it should. A few people got it in under 5 minutes, but the majority took about 10-15 which seems about right to me. I’m surprised there aren’t more “Writings” that are being found in Google Map sightseeing places. I knowthere are more unknown ones waiting to be found, I’ll have to look around more carefully.
Solution to “Keep Your Forests Green”

Ok, here’s one more clue to tide you over till later in the weekend. Another reader submitted clue, and I really liked this one which is why I decided to put it up right away. It reads “Keep Your Forests Green”. Please note: I have no idea if this has already been found on any of the other numerous google maps catalog pages, so there’s a chance you may already know the answer if you read those web pages. I hadn’t seen this one before though.

Another stab at non-specific geography for the word clue, this is Jeremy’s exact text. “Damn Northwest”. Ready, set, go…

Clue Name : Keep Your Forests Green!
Submitted by: Jeremy R.
Status : Solved
First Solved By : Josh H., Anonymous, Christopher A., Jason C., Andrew C.

Word Clues : “Damn Northwest”
Magnification Needed: 12/15
Difficulty : 5/10

SOLUTION TO “Keep Your Forests Green!”

Just a quick note that I’m now going to denote when a clue solution is PENDING. That is, a clue where there is at least one person that has solved it but the number is still under 5. This is to give everyone at least a shot at solving a clue while letting people know that they’d better get their solution in quick if they want to get their name next to the clue. I will try change the status of a clue as quickly as I can, but please don’t shoot me if I’m late!

The pending denotation will look like: Solution Pending (2/5). That means that there are 2 people who’ve submitted the correct answer, and when I get 3 more I’ll post up the solution. Interestingly, this wasn’t even necessary before, because multitudes of people were solving the clues immediately after they were posted! “Midwest Aliens” is taking some time, I suspect because of the low amount of geographical info in the clue. Look for more clues similar to this in the future!

This is not a clue, but an observation… In most of the clues posted, I try zoom into 15/15 magnification to screenshot the stuff and then save the link at the same 15/15. I then test it in the browser and I get back a nice 15/15 magnification shot so I assume that’s all good.

I’ve been noticing that if I quit out of the browser and then go back in and try and view the 15/15 link, it always seems to default to a farther away view of 14/15. Even after I take all the unnecessary junk out of the URL. I was wondering if anyone could confirm this is what happens to them as well. I guess it doesn’t really matter but I was wondering about it. The first time I really noticed that was happening was on Shreddies’ Google Sightseeing, where I’d go to look at one of his google map posts and the resulting view was always 14/15 when I thought for sure he would zoom it at 15/15.

Heyyy, so to tide everyone over until I can come up with more clues, here is our first reader submitted clue. A fun little UFO. Thank you to everyone who has sent in clues so far. P.S. the more obscure the clue (and location) the better…

So, this is another sort of experiment… I’m giving you the word clue just as Josh submitted it but you’ll notice that the “geographical”-ness of the clue is somewhat muted. “Midwest”… that’s all you get! I think this will make it a bit harder. However, on the other hand I’m thinking that it will cause the clue to be found almost exclusively by people who actually live in the vicinity of the clue. We’ll see I guess!

Oh so if you feel like it, along with the solution tell me if you are located close to the clue. This will give me some idea as to whether only people who are located near this clue are solving it.

Clue Name : Midwest Aliens
Submitted by: Josh G.
Status : Solved
First Solved By : Jason, FB, Adam M.

Word Clues : “Are there really aliens in the Midwest?”
Magnification Needed: 13/15
Difficulty : 6/10

SOLUTION TO “Midwest Aliens”

Dammmn. After posting this clue, I just went to make a sandwich for lunch. I came back and there’s all these solutions already! So, anyhow sorry if these are too easy! Of the first 15 or so people who solved it, the average time was about 7 minutes. You are all kick-ass at using Google Maps, much more so than me.

Solution to “Silver Spoon”

Almost everyone thinks this is a water tower, and now looking at it, that’s what it seems to be. From Josh:

This is clearly a water tower just East of the Illinois-Central Railroad. To picture it think of a sphere on top of a tower, and account for the angle of the satillite that took it.

One reader mentioned that it’s not the graphical clues that are too easy but it’s the WORD clues that are the giveaways. They suggest not to include any geographical location in the word clue at all. Hmm. I think I might take that advice into account, or at least cut down on the number of giveaway locations in the Word Clue. It’s tough though. I think I would be happy with an average time to solve of about 10 minutes.

Ok, give me some time to come up w/ more clues…