I’m not a big fan of computer games. I play those Bejeweled-style things where you match up three or more matching items, sometimes when I’m stressed out I play a few rounds of Sudoku as a sort of aid to meditation, and I’m experimenting with Papa Pear Saga, but I’m about at the end of my interest on that one. I’ve always been kind of curious about video games, though, and have kind of wanted to try more.
And if there’s one thing I like to do, it’s go places and walk around. If I can meet new people in the process, that’s a plus. So, when I discovered the existence of Pokémon GO, I figured that I could go places and walk around, meet new people, and possibly satisfy some of my curiosity regarding video games.
I downloaded the game the day before we left on our vacation and went around the block capturing my first few Pokémon. I giggled the whole time.
San Antonio International Airport has quite a few Pokéstops (and that’s where I figured out what the heck those things were and how to use them; I gotta tell you, “Flying Manbaby” had me really confused for quite a while). Also, the Pokéstops are apparently left over from another game called Ingress, where they marked points of interest, and they completed a remodel in 2014. Somewhere along the line, the interesting part of some of the Pokéstops got lost, I think.
Nevertheless, I did make some progress in figuring the game out while we waited. I also caught my first Pokémon of the trip almost as soon as we landed. There was a Ponyta on the baggage carousel. That was pretty exciting, if I do say so.
As we traveled around the Salt Lake City area, I caught more Pokémon and Alex helped me figure out reliably get a Pokéstop to cough up its pokéballs, eggs, etc. (you spin the center circle by swiping). I didn’t bump into any other grown-ups playing Pokémon GO in Salt Lake City, though. A few kids, but no adults.
We didn’t have phone or internet service in Yellowstone itself, unfortunately, so I will never know what Pokémon or Pokéstops I would have seen there. However, so many people were playing in our hotel in West Yellowstone that I caught a number of them in my room, where I still was on roaming, but at least I had access to the hotel’s wi-fi.
We stopped for lunch in Jackson on our way from Yellowstone to Vernal, Utah. I had phone service there, but the Pokémon GO servers were busy, so I never even saw a damn Pokéstop on that part of the trip.
We had service again in Vernal, Utah. I caught a few in the hotel and hit a few Pokéstops in Dinosaur National Monument and again on our half-hour return to Salt Lake City.
I caught my final Pokémon of the trip at the gate at the airport for our return flight. It was another Ponyta. That made a nice bookend to the 2016 vacation Pokémon. I know that those two Ponyta and everything in between it were from that trip. Now, to wee if the Chicago trip (18 days away!) will bookend itself so nicely.
This weekend, I hope to visit an actual park, rather than just picking up stray Pokémon in the parking lot at work, and possibly to return to Alex and my project of trying to walk the entire Riverwalk. We’re down to Mission San Jose, so two more missions and we’re done.