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

Good monday morning to you! This clue is called “No Sunken Treasure” for the obvious reasons… I think that boat decided to try make its passengers sick by driving in a curved fashion. Either that or he doesn’t know where he’s going. In any case, in addition to the wake, there are 2 vertical lines that give the impression of a dollar sign in the muddy water.

The clue is a bit light on contrast, so you may need to adjust your monitor to really see the lines. Randy M. sent in this clue about a week ago and I just got to it now. He called it “Money In The Water” but I changed it to “No Sunken Treasure” because I really like that Wilco song…

Even though it requires 14/15, I’m not sure how hard this one will be, but I suspect it will not be tough once you get the right location out of the word clues. Which are: “Holy Freshwater French King in Misery”. I made this one up myself (*groans from audience*)… hehe, which as always means that you’ll probably have a harder time… I can already see one big scavengeroogle herring that may crop up, so look for a clue drop to correct that halfway through, if not earlier.

We are going to let this clue bake in the oven for about 5 hours on medium high until nice and crispy. Or 2:00 p.m. PDT today. Time’s a-wasting… get going!

[Edit: 11:30 PDT - This should clear up some of the mud: “Freshwater” does NOT refer to a river. Repeat, it’s not a river.]

Clue Name : “No Sunken Treasure”
Submitted by: Randy M.
Status : Solved (16)
Duration: 9:00 a.m. - 2:00 p.m. PDT

Solved By: Chris R, Mike M, Brian G, Ian T, Brian M, Jason C, Robert M, Scott L, Rian B, Tony A, John F, Justin, Matthew T, Josh H, Phil M, Eric W

Word Clues : “Holy Freshwater French King in Misery”
Magnification Needed: 14/15

SOLUTION TO “No Sunken Treasure”

Well, as I stated earlier, we’ve chucked the “Difficulty” rating for clues for now. Way too subjective…

So, say hi to “Say Hi To Your Mom”. Yeah, yeah… I know it’s not exactly the letters HI in a row. It’s more of a diagonal “HI” and even then you’ve gotta twist your head a bit. But still I thought this clue sent in by Ben O. was interesting. Friendly buildings that want to say “Hi”!

By the way, I haven’t heard songs from Say Hi To Your Mom, the band. Are they any good?

I’ve been getting a lot of clue submissions that are actually famous places or places other google sightseeing sites have already listed. It’s actually easier to use completely unknown locations, because it levels the playing field a bit. Like, there’s less chance of someone living in the same city as a famous landmark and recognizing it right away. In fact, for the last clue more than one person who lived in Texas and even near the area had no idea where the flag was. Which is as it should be!

One of the best ways to come up with a clue is to search your hometown, which is what I believe Ben did here. (Note: if you know who Ben is, don’t play this one!)

Right. So you want the word clues. Gahh.. I am so bad at these. Please, please, if you submit a clue, try send in a clever word clue so my brain doesn’t fizzle trying to come up with one:

“Somerset Maugham enjoys St. Patty’s Day in a cemetery”

Sorry, it is long. Also watch your step, you almost squished a red herring…

This is the last clue till probably Sat night or Sunday Monday but you’ve only got until 6:00 p.m. PDT. That’s when I need to bail. Now, drop those work papers and get with the program!

[Edit: 2:56 PDT - Hm… silence. Er, how about remove the word “Maugham” from the clue? That be a red herring.]

[Edit: 3.29 PDT - Eeek. I’m sorry, y’all. This is proving tough. TGIF! Um. Maybe focus on “cemetery”?]

[Edit: 4.17 PDT - Someone wrote in that they wanted to “kick my ass sideways”, so I better drop another clue: Not in MD. ]

Clue Name :Say Hi To Your Mom
Submitted by: Ben O.
Status : Solved (8)
Duration: 2:00 p.m. - 6:00 p.m. PDT

Solved By: John F, Tony A, Scott L, Jason C, Angie S, Ian T, Tina, Max

Word Clues : “Somerset Maugham enjoys St. Patty’s Day in a cemetery”
Magnification Needed: 13/15

SOLUTION TO “Say Hi To Your Mom”

Howdy, pardner. Someway or another, all roads lead back to Texas. At least for Scavengeroogle clues. So anyhow, Mike Z. sent in this cool shot of a honest to goodness Texas flag painted on top of some building or other. His original word clues were going to involve sports teams, but he mentioned another angle on it that might be possible and I decided to go with that instead.

So the word clues for this are: “What’s with these homies dissin’ my girl?” You read that right. Homies. Dissin’. Girl.

I don’t think this wouldn’t be such a hard clue, except that the flag is pretty much only visible at 14/15 and isn’t out in the wilderness where it could be easily spotted. So I gave it a “6″ for difficulty. We shall see. Hm… I don’t believe I’ve ever given a difficulty greater than 7. Maybe clues should be on a scale of 1-7…

Oh yeah, resuming the experiment… we’re doing time trials again today. Everyone who gets a solution in before the cutoff gets listed. And of course I may drop a 2nd hint midway through, so if you get frustrated y’all come back then. This clue should launch at 8:00 a.m. PDT if all goes well. You’ve got until 1:00 p.m. PDT. Five hours for a chance at fame and glory. Hup, hup!

[Edit: 10:48 PDT - Clues rollin’ in, so I think we’ll hold off on a second clue for now. Happy friday… ]

Clue Name : Texas Pride
Submitted by: Mike Z.
Status : Solved
Duration : 8:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m. PDT

Solved By: Sara P, Mike M, Tina, Chris R, Ryan, Eric W, Phil, Kristopher W, Daniel M., Greg J, James C, JR F, Brian, Ramy, John F, Carl, Shawn D, Leroy T, Steve A, Mark, Ja, Rick B

Word Clues : “What’s with these homies dissin’ my girl?”
Magnification Needed: 14/15
Difficulty : 6/10

SOLUTION TO “Texas Pride”

What, 3 clues in a day? Well, I wanted to experiment with something, so here you go!

So, the experiment is… I am testing out a new way of doing “Pending Solutions”. Instead of just taking the first five solutions, I am going to take ALL correct solutions sent in before a given deadline. Note that I am on Pacific Time (PDT?). If I get too many, as in hundreds, I am going to have to not write them all down. I’m just testing this out to see if we can give more people an opportunity to solve the clues while still rewarding the “first” people to solve it…

The Deadline for this clue is: Today (Thurs) 9:00 p.m. PDT

Haha, I sort of picture the scenario for this clue as a top secret government bunker hidden in the woods. Noobie Worker, who has just been transfered here as punishment, has wandered into the top secret control room. Fat Lazy Armchair General, looking to show Noobie Worker a good time, gestures to the control panel of thousands of buttons and says “I bet you can’t tell me which of these buttons launches our New-Fangled Missile Interceptor.” Noobie Worker, who watches too much Looney Toones, immediately reaches over Fat Lazy Armchair General and slams the Big Red Button marked “Do Not Press”. And Fat Lazy Armchair General screams, “Not The RED Button…!”

*Explode*

Hurhhh, huhhr… sometimes I funny. Anyhow, this looks to be a google defect, though Josh H. doesn’t rule out the possibility of it being either a smoke cloud or fire. What do you think it is? Your word clue, if you should choose to accept this mission, is “Custer’s ghost roaming the highway”. I’ve omitted an important item in Josh’s original word clue… the number of the highway. I may or may not be giving that away later on, should it prove too difficult…

[Edit: *Ding* Two hours have passed so I feel obliged to offer up the magic number: HWY 16. Don’t get yer hopes up though… there’s a LOT of HWY 16]

Clue Name : Not The RED Button
Submitted by: Josh H.
Status : Solved
Duration : 2:00 p.m. - 9:00 p.m. PDT

First Solved By: Curt M., Charlie E., Jason C., James C.
Solved After 2nd Clue: Amanda, Justin, Jon, Rich T., Robert M., Chris C., Kyle M., Tony A., Jared R., Shawn D., Michael J., Mike S.

Word Clues : “Custer’s ghost roaming the highway”
Magnification Needed: 13/15
Difficulty : 5/10

SOLUTION TO “Not The RED Button”

Fresh off the press. I have a feeling this one might be too easy, but I likes the looks of it. It looks like the top part of a question mark or the way a cat curls its tail. It also looks like an inverted “C”. Well, maybe that’s a bit of a stretch. But too bad. That’s the clue you’re going to get: “C and Cake”. Since this feature is really recognizable at 10/15 and I have a feeling local residents are going to get it right away, I felt I needed to have a completely non-geographic word clue. Thinking caps: on…

Hm…actually, I think I may have seen this Question Mark on TV before…?

Man, thinking up these word clues are keeping me up at night! If you submit a clue, make sure to submit a word clue along with it so my brain doesn’t explode from trying to think these up.

P.S. If you are coming here from College Humor, welcome! Look around and try out some of the clues; Even though the majority have been officially “solved” that doesn’t mean you can’t try them out too! New clues posted daily as well.

Clue Name : Question Mark
Submitted by: Scavengeroogle Admin
Status : Solved
First Solved By : Andrew, James C., Jared R., Ramy, Tina

Word Clues : “C and Cake”
Magnification Needed: 10/15
Difficulty : 5/10

SOLUTION TO “Question Mark”

This clue was submitted by Wes B. and guess what… it’s not in Texas! Amazing. Anyhow, this is quite visible at 10/15 so I’m predicting it will rate around a 3 or so difficulty. In other words, it shouldn’t be too bad. Famous last words.

Wes’s original clue title was actually “I’m a Little (Sideways) Teacup” but I truncated that for brevity. Interestingly, the sideways cup also look sort of like a high heel. Here is his word clue: “Go Ducks”. I think that should be very doable, but as always I’m more than willing to drop another clue if it proves difficult going.

A side note: I just realized I can future date posts… so that way i can get you your clues earlier in the morning (especially for those east coasters).

Clue Name : I’m A Little Teacup
Submitted by: Wes B.
Status : Solved
First Solved By : Mike Z.,Robert M., Bill P., Dan K., James C., Jason C., Matt R., Blake L., Shawn D.,Brian G.

Word Clues : “Go Ducks”
Magnification Needed: 10/15
Difficulty : 3/10

SOLUTION TO “I’m A Little Teacup”

I know, I know. I just got through talking about the clue schedule being in the morning blah blah, but I just had to post this clue up because it made my day (or rather, night). It’s an honest to goodness “emoticon” found by Johnny K. while surfing around google maps. Very large at 12/15, and I have a feeling that once again people who live near the area will get it right away. Yeah we’re in Texas again. Just can’t seem to get away from the Lone Star. Well, Texas never whispers (inside joke).

As to the word clues… hmm. There weren’t any provided with this submission. It’s fast becoming the most difficult part of Scavengeroogle for me to figure out word clues that are fun yet difficult, but not TOO difficult. Let’s go with “White House”, and if that’s too hard I’ll add another word clue or two later that may help. I actually am pretty sure I know what this sad face building really is… but someone from the area can probably tell us more.

[Edit: A little nudge, as promised… “White House” in a different language may help you out.]

Clue Name : Sad Texan
Submitted by: Johnny K.
Status : Solved
First Solved By : Mike Z., Robert M., Bill P., Dan K., James C., Jason C., Matt R., Blake L., Shawn D., Brian G.

Word Clues : “White House”
Magnification Needed: 12/15
Difficulty : 4/10

SOLUTION TO “Sad Texan”

I’ve seen a number of these weird “google defects” when surfing around. I’m not sure if this is some sort of problem with the satellite transmission, google’s stiching algorithm, or an honest to goodness reflection of sunlight. It’s interesting in that it’s in the shape of a cross almost… anyone know what can cause that? This was submitted by Alex P. who was going to give you the super ambiguous word clue of “Canada Suburbs”, but I thought that would probably be a little too hard, so I’ll give you an additional hint of “Longueuil”… rolls right off the tongue, don’t it. Longueuil Tongue. Har…

In any case, I’m not going to post too many of these google defects because chances are, they’ll go away when google gets new satellite maps and then I’ll be left with a bunch of clues that can’t be found! And that would net me a lot of angry emails…

Clue Name : Giant Spark
Submitted by: Alex P.
Status : Solved
First Solved By : Colin P., Jason C., Dan S., Shawn D., Excelsior

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

SOLUTION TO “Giant Spark”

E is for… Easy, Extreme, Elephant, Eels. I don’t know, think of something good! This looks like a bunch of building that happened to be arranged in the letter “E”. You can see it from really far out, 12/15. Shouldn’t be too difficult given the word clues, but I’ve been chastised about saying things are too easy before, so… searchers beware. Anyhow, Jeremy sent this clue in, but I modified the word clues to make it a bit shorter. All you get is “NY 684″. Gentlemen, start your google maps…

Clue Name : Brought To You By The Letter E
Submitted by: Jeremy R.
Status : Solved
First Solved By : Jason C., Christohper A., Colin P., Josh H., Sam O.

Word Clues : “NY 684″
Magnification Needed: 12/15
Difficulty : 3/10

SOLUTION TO “Brought To You By The Letter E”

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”

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”