The 2001 Tombstone Trail was one of the coldest and windiest of recent years, but everyone seemed to have a pretty good time, despite the cold. 34 teams showed up in Cannon Falls, MN for the 24th running of the Tombstone Trail.
Like last year, contestants had to travel around Goodhue County, trying to figure out where some pictures were taken. 30 of the pictures were taken at cemeteries and 24 at other "special" locations, such as mailboxes, ATMs and Adopt-a-Highway signs.
The rallymasters came up with a new twist this year: The Goodhue County Corn Maze. One third of the "special" pictures were taken inside the maze, a huge maze cut from a field of corn. Of course in October the corn is over your head, and it was dark, and, by the way, on the night of the Tombstone Trail the maze was "haunted", and you never knew who or what was going to jump out and grab you from behind.
We figured that the winners would choose to do the corn maze, since it counted for 1/3 of your final score. Boy, were we wrong. The top 3 teams all chose not to do the maze. Turns out, through the process of elimination and some good, educated guessing, that you can figure out all the corn maze pictures without even going there! OK, we learned something, and you can bet that if we ever return to the maze, it will be different.
Some folks got a bit of a thrill this year, thanks to the neighbor across the street from one of the oldest cemeteries in Goodhue County. He hung a human scarecrow behind a tree in the cemetery, where you wouldn't see it until it caught your attention as you passed the tree. I got quite a few reports about that one, and next time we use that cemetery I'll stop and thank him for a job well done!
Leslie Schoenfelder and LaRae Ekblad took top honors this year, winning class C and only missing 3 pictures all night. 2nd place went to Dane Christensen and Dan Meyer, who also finished 1st in class B.
3rd overall and 1st in class A went to last year's overall winners, Al and Margaret Kintigh. 2nd in A and 4th overall were Stu Tanquist and Jon Helberg, with Keith Ohlendorf and Emily Burton-Weinman 3rd in A and 5th overall.
Doug Atwill and John Wiersma, running their first ever Tombstone Trail, finished 1st in class D, 8th overall. The best story award went to Max Hinkley for his tale of a romantic encounter by some Tombstone Trail contestants running the event on their anniversary.
The team of Linda and Bobbe Norenberg took home the most hardware, taking the coveted "dead last" award along with the trophy for the best costumes.
You can find out more about the Tombstone Trail by joining our online discussion group at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/tombstonetrail. We'll post information there about the 2002 Tombstone Trail to be run out of Rochester, MN.
Thanks to Brad Odegard for doing the official precheck, registration and scoring. Thanks to Rachel Larson for all your help in setting up the event and to Kristen (sorry, I forgot your last name) for helping with the trophies and being such a good kid.
Hope to see you all next year for the 25th running of the Tombstone Trail!
Mark Larson
Rallymaster
You can see the event results here.