Day 4

Jackson Mississippi to Tuscaloosa Alabama.

It’s our fourth day and we’ve done so much it’s hard to put everything together. This event is action packed and keeps you on your toes. We get sent off in the morning by the Mayor of Jackson and we start to solve our clues. Our first clue takes us to Hattiesburg Mississippi, where Jimmy Buffet went to college. At the university of Southern Mississippi we need to find a guy sitting on some steps playing guitar. Eventually we find him and we become official parrot heads! After that we travel to an old Coca-Cola bottling factory that has been converted in a awesome restaurant and bar. Here is our passage control and we meet up with all the Fireballers. A lot of local people show up to greet us and it’s a great place to pass out flyers of the missing children and meet some friendly people.

So far I have to say the people in the south are very friendly and nice, something we’re not so used to in Chicago. Here they stop to say hello and go out of their way to help you out or just to ask how you’re doing. And the food! The Bottling Company restaurant has an amazing aura about it. Very old and rustic with exposed brick and a vintage feel to it. A nice stage where they have a blues guitarist and his band putting out some good old blues. I ate the best burger I’ve tasted in a while, sipped on some Coke from a glass bottle, and enjoyed some true classic blues, doesn’t get much better than this.

After Hattiesburg we hit the road to Tuscaloosa, Alabama. We solve a couple of more missions here and take pictures for proof. We solve our clues immediately and we’re doing really well. Our final check in is at the BFGoodrich tire plant in Tuscaloosa. We roll in and to our surprise we’re the third team there!

At the end of the day they have one more challenge for us, an autocross. To make it interesting they make us wear beer goggles! With Tuscaloosa police on hand, they make us wear these vision distorting goggles that simulate a 0.08 BAC. Frank has been itching to drive so I promised him the day before he could do the autocross. Needless to say he is not happy about driving a super tight course with beer goggles on. His ego gets crushed as he plows down cones and three point turns his way to an 11th place finish. Of course we relentlessly poke fun of Frank ‘The Tank’ for his stellar performance and as always, he takes it in stride. I have a feeling at the next autocross (a real one) he’ll redeem himself. The night concludes with a speech from the Mayor and wonderful dinner and reception at a local bar/restaurant.