High-Tech Treasure Hunt in a Beautiful Italian City...

I am sitting here web dreaming and I stumbled across a web site that is infused with life and fun. Suddenly I realised why it is familiar, it is the company owned by an old friend, who also very kindly designed my web site for me. Being nosy and with admiration at the hard work and energy of this company I looked at one of the projects H-farm have given life to and want to share it here with you because it is just so much fun!

A lot of couples ask me to help arrange additional activities for their wedding weekend or week. Some of these extra activities are wine tasting, cooking classes, vespa tours and boat trips to name a few so when I saw this I though how this could be a totally different fun way of interducing your guests to their host city. If your guests are anything like my friends it becomes a treasure hunt with a healthy level of compertition!  

The WHAIWHAI web site describe this guide as unconventional: they are collections of jumbled short stories that become readable one at a time as you solve enigmas and send your answers via text message. Each city has a unique character. That’s why each guidebook tells a different tale, through a collection of short stories about its most fascinating places. The narrative plunges you into the city’s ambience, while the individual short stories are the keys to discovering it and learning about it. With WHAIWHAI, you’ll move away from the beaten tourist track and go where the city’s more unfamiliar spirit is hidden.



So basically Whaiwhai is a high-tech Italian touring game that is part “Amazing Race” and part treasure hunt, with a bit of DaVinci Code-style storytelling mixed in.

In Venice, for example, you trace the disappearance of a fictional magic scepter stolen from the Chinese emperor Khubla Khan by Marco Polo. A secret code sent via text message starts the game. You advance to landmarks like the Piazza San Marco, where new codes are sent after correctly answering questions.

Fusing fact and fiction, Whaiwhai (which means “to search for” in Maori), was created by the Italian game developer Log607, and is available for four Italian cities: Rome, Florence, Venice and Verona.

Sold in Italy since 2008, where it is a cult hit, whaiwhai is now available in the United States through SelectItaly.com in both English and Italian for $33.75. A $75.95 kit includes a book, city map and an Italian SIM card (for local text-messaging).

The game lasts from two and nine hours, with the option to pause any time for gelato.