An Annual Treasure Hunt That Yields Riches for Charity

By HOLLY HALL

Amateur sleuths compete against one another in an annual treasure hunt that netted

$15,000 this year for the Hamilton Family Center, a San Francisco shelter for homeless families.

For the past two years, the center has been the beneficiary of the hunt, which Jayson Wechter, a local private investigator, created a decade ago as a way to raise money for his favorite charities.

Each year, Mr. Wechter spends months doing research and walking the city to come up with clues based on historical lore, architectural treasures, and other interesting tidbits about San Francisco’s back streets and alleys.

Confined to Chinatown, the Financial District, and North Beach, the competition is planned to coincide with the Chinese New Year parade. The firecrackers, dancing dragons, and parade crowds make a lively backdrop to the competition. Participants each pay $20 to $25 if they register in advance to compete in one of three versions of the hunt: beginner’s, regular, or master’s hunt. Each version has 16 clues.

Entrants must compete in teams of between four and nine people. They may form a team in advance, as many do, or they are assigned to one when they arrive at the registration site. Each team gets one map, one set of rules, and a sealed envelope containing the clues, which may be solved in any order.

The sleuthing begins promptly at 5:30 p.m., when the teams are dispatched with a loudspeaker announcement, and ends at 9:30 p.m., when they are due back.

The rules are simple: Team members must stay together, must travel on foot, and are encouraged to bring a flashlight, which comes in handy after dark. They may also bring their own maps and other references like guidebooks or historical works that could be useful in solving clues.

All of the clues lead to specific locations. Once there, a team must find and record a sequence of carefully hidden letters (inch-high adhesive characters) that Mr. Wechter has put in place. The teams that return earliest with all of the letters for each clue correctly recorded are the winners. Second- and third-place honors go to the runners-up in each version of the contest.

Winning teams receive a bottle of inexpensive champagne, an award certificate, “and the right to gloat,” says Mr. Wechter. “I purposely made this simple, because I wanted the treasure hunt to be its own reward.”

That seems to be incentive enough: The event has more than 1,000 participants annually, many in teams that compete year after year.

About 10 volunteers are needed to register people as they arrive, handing out clues and other materials, Mr. Wechter says. Costs of the event, which grossed $29,000 this year, include printing of fliers, mailings to previous participants, payment for a publicist who generates coverage of the event, supplies, a city permit for use of the registration site, and a fee to reimburse Mr. Wechter for his work.

For more information, contact Jayson Wechter, 480 Second Street, Suite 100, San Francisco 94107; (415) 597-7724.