My journey began with a wait in a long line--by the time I arrived at Justin Herman Plaza at 6:45pm, there was a line wrapped all the way around the plaza with many twists and turns, and it was barely moving. The organizers were trying out a new tracking system using QR codes, and it turned out that scanning all the codes with smart phones took more time than expected. Eventually, the organizers stopped taking everyone's picture and scanning their code at the start and just started handing out ribbons and manifests.

The map


By the scheduled start of 7:30pm there were over 1000 people in the plaza.


I had showed up with a group of friends, and we intended to run most of it together. Someone yelled, "GO" and we started running toward checkpoint 1A. Our group was split from 5 down to 3 by an ill-timed traffic light and a chaser, and I arrived at checkpoint 1A to find hundreds of other people already there. After doing the hokey pokey and a few congo lines, I tried to get my manifest signed only to be refused because I hadn't done a congo line yet--the people at the first checkpoint were absolutely overwhelmed with runners and couldn't tell us apart. Eventually though, I managed to get my manifest stamped, rejoined with my group of friends, and headed off to checkpoint 2.

On the way, we decided to stop at the more western bonus checkpoint to search for an Object of Power. I had my first chaser encounter of the evening when a 10 runners sprinted up out of a stairwell pursued closely by a pack of chasers. I hid in a doorway until they passed, and then continued onto the bonus location (splitting me again from my friends). There, I found a "protester" holding up a sign which on the back said, "Sorry runner, your object is at another location." Later I found out that the Object of Power obtainable at the other bonus location was a get out of jail free card that you could use if a chaser caught you. Sadly I did not obtain one, and continued on to checkpoint 2.

Upon arriving at checkpoint 2A, I entered dojo to begin my ninja training. I was given a plushy animal and told to hide behind a tree and attack incoming runners with said plushy animal. Again, the checkpoint was overwhelmed with runners, but after returning the plushy animal and affirming loudly to my sensei that "I AM A NINJA," my manifest was stamped. I met up with one of my friends again, and the two of us took off to checkpoint 3.

We were starting to get a little worried about chasers, so we decided to head around the backside of checkpoint 3 through some of the sketchier parts of the tenderloin. We picked up another runner along the way, and I was glad to have my two male companions running with me when some drunk guys along the route started taunting me with "Hey pink cheeks, hey pink cheeks, nice pink cheeks, front AND back," as I ran by.

At checkpoint 3, I had to renew my permit for time travel at the California DTV (Department of Time Vehicles), which like everything in the California Bureaucracy meant filling out a form and waiting in a long line. After about 20 minutes of waiting in line, my form was inspected, my manifest was stamped, and I was on my way.

As I was about to leave the safezone, I received two texts from the friends I had become separated from. The first said, "We are caught." The second said, "The area between 3 and 4 is a sea of red." The friend I was still with and I decided to take the 22 bus from Church and Market to the edge of the the safezone for checkpoint 4 to avoid this "sea of red." Unfortunately, we missed the 22 by 30 seconds and the next one wasn't coming for almost half an hour. Luckily, the bus stop we were at was right next to a taqueria, so we decided to stop and refuel. Inside, I ran into a friend from undergrad who I hadn't seen in years. He turned out to be quite useful, because as we were leaving the taqueria, we noticed that between us and the door was a chaser ordering a taco. She was absorbed in her iphone though, so we had my old friend walk in front of us on the way out of the taqueria--the chaser glanced up at him, saw he didn't have a ribbon, and continued playing with her phone. We escaped unscathed.

We boarded the bus (safezone!) and breathed a sigh of relief. This sigh of relief was shortlived however, as it seemed that at every stop more and more chasers boarded the bus. The one standing in front of me was counting the blue ribbons he had collected; he already had 9. By the time we reached the stop we wanted there were over a dozen chasers on the bus. We didn't want to stay on the bus indefinitely, so there was nothing to do but get off the bus and run.

My friend and I stepped off the bus and started sprinting. I decided to run away from the safezone, as it was uphill and I had sized up the chasers while on board the bus and figured I could outrun them in an uphill chase. I made it up the block, around a corner, and dove between some parked cars. After a few minutes I determined that no one was still chasing me, but I also received a text from my remaining friend, "Got Tagged. Good luck." I was on my own.

I ran a circuitous route with aching knees to the safezone for checkpoint 4, ran under the freeway for awhile, and found myself at a hipster dance party. While I rocked out, I was given sunglasses and a questionnaire. Apparently they just let anyone hang out in Delores park these days, and the folks throwing the dance party wanted to make sure that I was cool enough to hang out with.

Question 1: Are you a hipser? "No"
Question 2: Do you like fixies? "Fuck fixies."
.....

They eventually determined that I wasn't a hipster, but had me draw a picture of myself drinking my favorite beer. I drew a naked woman drinking beer. The checkpoint hipster started drawing clothes on my naked drawing and I protested, "If my boobs are hanging out like that I certainly wouldn't be wearing pants." The checkpoint hipster had to consult with another hipster to see if I would be allowed to pass.

Hipster1: "Hey, this chick is a nudist, what do we do?"
Hipster2: "Well, at least she isn't shirtcocking, I'd say it's fine."
Hipster1: "Okay, fine runner. But first we need to give you some facial hair."

I decided on a Mike Tyson-esque sharpie drawing on my face instead of a sharpie mustache, and once it was determined that my pants were tight enough already to not need to safety pin them tighter, I got my manifest stamped and was set to go. I got a phone call from my roommate who had given up earlier and went home asking how much longer I was going to play. I looked at my watch. It was late enough that if I kept going and got past checkpoint 5, there was no chance of catching the last BART to the east bay. I responded, "Fuck it, I'm going for it. My phone battery is dying though, so I'm not sure I'll be able to let you know when I'm done. Sorry." With that, I hung up and set out for checkpoint 5.

At this point my knees were really killing me. I tend to bike for exercise, not run, so the pounding on the pavement was really starting to get to me. As I headed for checkpoint 5 though, some chasers saw me and the 5 of them pursued me all the way to the safe zone. The jolt of adrenaline I felt while trying to escape was enough to drown the pain in my knees.

When I arrived at checkpoint 5, I found an extremely inefficient TSA security checkpoint (I gather that inefficiency was the point of this one). I saw that they generally took longer "screening" people who were wearing more baggy clothing and I was in a hurry to get going, so I decided the best route would be to take most of my clothes off. I stood in the "security" line in my tie-dye underwear and bra, and when I arrived at the front of the line my manifest was immediately stamped and I was sent on my way. [Note to self: try this with the real TSA sometime]

On the way to checkpoint 6, I passed two girls who had just been mugged and dragged across the pavement by 3 thugs. They were talking to a battery of 8-10 police officers, and I reminded myself that I should watch my back for more than just chasers. In addition to sketchy people I tried to avoid, I saw many chasers between 5 and 6, but ultimately made it checkpoint 6 safely.

When I entered checkpoint 6 I found a group of doctors, who were at first were amazed to see me. Apparently not many runners had made it this far. Once they determined that yes, I was a runner, they were eager to diagnose me. First I talked with Doctor Fraud, who read me a list of words and then had me respond with the first thing that came to mind. The lists started out fairly innocuous, but soon I detected a pattern.

"present" "birthday"
"box" "cardboard"
"cooter" "umm, vagina"
"kitty" "vagina"
"poon" "also vagina"
"Hmmmmm, also vagina you say..... Why don't I send you to Dr. Pussyfingers?"

Dr. Pussyfingers assured me that her real name was Dr. Yoni Wiff, and had me and few others participate in some group therapy (which included singing to and hugging the yoni tree). I was finally diagnosed with Fear of Time Travel and sent to the pharmacy where I was given "medicine" (candy, which was precisely what I needed after running for 5 hours). Finally, my manifest was full of stamps and it was off to the finish line!



The way to the finish was littered with chasers. It seemed that everyone was camped out in the endgame just hoping to nail some poor sucker who had been running for hours. I anticipated this and veered far to the west. I got kind of lost, but I also saw hardly any chasers on my wayward route. Finally, I was approaching Bernal Heights from the west side and saw a staircase leading up into the park. As I climbed into the darkness the fog thickened to the point of drizzle. I climbed all the way to the top of the hill, and found.....nothing. I looked around and figured that everyone had gone home. It was 12:30 after all, and awards had happened at midnight. I stood there on the top of the hill, muscles aching, and I looked down and the city enshrouded in fog and decided that it was worth it anyway. I made it!

About 5 seconds later I realized that I hadn't walked all around the top of the hill yet, so decided to just check the east side of the hill, and there was the finish. I walked over and asked where to check in. The first person to see me said, "Holy shit guys, a RUNNER! A runner made it!" He escorted me to the man with the laptop. When the man with the laptop scanned me, he informed me that I was the 11th runner to finish [update: apparently I finished tenth], and awarded me a few shiny "journey buttons" to wear. I high fived all around, found someone to give me a beverage (man was I thirsty!), and met several cool people on that misty hilltop.

Eventually, I began to concern myself with how to return to the east bay. It was looking grim, but luckily I had my own personal hero that night who drove over and picked me (and 3 others) up from the vicinity of the finish and took us home. This praxis is dedicated to him, so he can read about my adventure that had him driving into SF at 2am to pick up a group of sweaty crazy people. Thanks hero!

This is what I looked like when I got home that night, tired but happy!

---

Post-mortem

I mapped out my approximate route here. The letter T occurs at Tacos, and the letter R occurs at the place where I had to Run from the bus full of chasers. I ended up running ~11 miles, minus the bus ride down 16th, plus more because I don't remember every street I ran down only to see chasers looming, plus the amount it took me to get down off the hill and in the car for the ride home. It felt like a ton of climbing while I was running, but in reality it was only ~450ft. of climbing. Apparently I am a pansy about running uphill. Here is the log of my journey from the QR code scans at checkpoints.

I talked with a friend who had come in 3rd place at ~3h17m. He said that he got to the first checkpoint first, and hence at all checkpoints he didn't have to wait in any lines. I think that if I had gotten to the first checkpoint faster I could have finished a lot faster--I spent between 7 and 30 minutes at all the checkpoints and that really slowed me down.