But... HOW!? by Samantha
June 20th, 2011 9:50 PMThis is a community game/environment cleaning, super awesome annual event that began years ago in Wisconsin, and has expanded to the waterways of Minnesota.
Best put in the words of Matt, the event organizer, "It is random boat theatre".
There are questers, people playing the game and collecting litter from the lakes in the play area, and there are characters the questers interact with, characters that give depth to the Adventures' back story, and who send the players on mini quests that the questers can choose to finish for more points.
I volunteered to be one such character.
I played the role of Kapuna, a,local sage that guards the waterways from dimensional traveling wizards and any other threats.
I was a critical character, because I gave out phrases and magic items that the questers needed to win treasure maps, which would help them progress father in the game, and which would help them earn extra points.
It was quite difficult to take pictures with my phone whilst one handedly balancing a kayak that is afloat in the middle of a lake, but I managed to get some nice shots. They shall continue the story from here:
me-1.jpg
I am Kapuna, wise local sage that guards my waterways.
map.jpg
A map of the play area. You might notice that my character wasn't assigned a specific lake. That's because the questers needed to interact with my character for many sub quests. Part of the challenge was that they needed to find me first :D
wizard 2.jpg
One of my characters' foes, an evil wizard trying to steal the powerful artifact.
wizard matt.jpg
This is Matt, the organizer, in partial costume. He was another wizard adversary of my character, Kapuna. Both wizards stood on surfboards and paddled themselves around.
Garbaestar-2.jpg
Another one of the volunteer characters in his canoe with his dog.
Garbaestar.jpg
He's out of costume right now, but he had a black cloak and some kind of froggy luchador mask.
my-feets.jpg
Me and my kayak out on the lake.
bridge-1.jpg
Me paddling under and through a woody bridge. The water isn't quite as shallow as it looks in this picture.
bridge-2.jpg
Looking up at the light coming through the gaps in the woody bridge.
bridge-3.jpg
Here you can see beams of the bridge through the water.
muscrat.jpg
Some of the local wildlife. I had to paddle like mad to keep up with her.
turtle-on-a-log.jpg
A big ol' snapping turtle sunning on a partially submerged log.
ducks-close.jpg
A duck family swimming by.
ducks.jpg
Ducks, clouds, sail boats, and the front end of a surf board.
can you find him?
A picture of a different muscrat that I literally nearly ran over with my kayak. If he hadn't swam away just in the nick of time, I would have crashed right into him with the front of my kayak. He had been floating so still that I thought he was a log!
tree.jpg
Look at this cool tree root system.
bench-feather.jpg
Someone stuck a pheasant feather into a crevice in the corner of a bench I passed while paddling.
grafitti.jpg
I really liked this grafitti of a gathering of beings found underneath a bridge that I'd paddled under.
grafitti-eyes.jpg
Their eyes were dripping
through-the-water1.jpg
I took this shot to try and show how you can see through the water straight to the bottom.
through-the-water3.jpg
This looks like there's gold nuggets in the lake doesn't it?
WAS.jpg
Prettyness
me-2.jpg
It was hella hard taking pictures of myself whilst on a rocking kayak.
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Somehow I missed seeing this earlier- how fun!
A splendid diversion! Might you also nominate this nautical exercise as a task? Where might we find the rules of engagement & safety regulations?