«
»

The Amazing Race: The Finale

All teams left Moscow bound for Portland, OR! Nick & Starr, Ken & Tina and Dan & Andrew all arrived into Pdx International at the same time and it was seriously go time! All the adventure racers were off to Tilikum adventure camp to retrive their next clue: the final Detour

Detour: High and Dry or Low and Wet

High and Dry: Both team members had to climb thirty feet up a tree, traverse a 40-foot log, and then leap through the air to retrieve one half of their next clue. If either team member fell off the log without nabbing a clue, they had to start over from the beginning. When both team members successfully complete this task they then must put their halves of the clue together to be able to read and advance.

Low and Wet: Teams had to walk 850 feet across a floating log bridge over the water to a clue waiting on shore. None of the teams did this.

All the participants easily scaled the 40 foot tree, but only Tina had a major problem crossing the log and jumping to the clue. This appeared to the beginning of the end of Ken & Tina (Nick & Starr passed them at the High and Dry Detour).

The next clue takes all three teams to the Bridge of the Gods. Once here each member will take a zip line 2,000 to an island below. Low and behold (anyone knows what the phrase means?, anyway), Ken and Tina reclaimed the lead when Nick and Starr’s cabbie took another wrong turn. Starr must have been pissed.

Power of Memory: Working together, teams had to choose a game board with ten game pieces, each representing a leg of the race. Then, beginning with the first leg of the race and working in chronological order, teams had to remove a game piece revealing a symbol underneath. The symbols represented Route Info, Roadblock, Detour, or Pit Stop. Teams then had to enter a field containing 150 clueboxes (holy crap), each containing a picture. Teams had to search for the correct picture of the task, denoted by the symbol they revealed, which they had completed for the leg of the race the game piece number represented. When they entered the correct piece in the game board, a green light would turn on. Once all ten green lights were lit teams could receive their next clue.

Now back in Toyota Prius, teams raced downtown Portland to find a green dinosaur in the Portland Building (I know where it is, though I haven’t seen the green dino). Once racers reached the prehistoric creature they would receive their next clue.

Teams must now travel only a few block to Alder Street and search among food carts for the country from their last Pit Stop, Russia. When they find the cart they would receive their next clue.

This clue was very similar to how High Trek Adventure writes its clues, though the clue was the tagline for the final cluebox: look for the place where “the magic is in the hole.”

Nick & Starr reached Voodoo Donuts first, but Ken & Tina were not far behind. It was all going to come down to who could hail a cab first. One team should have gone to Burnside while the other should have gone headed to one of the downtown hotels.

Next teams must head to Pittock Mansion. This will be the final Pit Stop for The Amazing Race 13. Here’s how they finished:

1. Nick & Starr
2. Ken & Tina
3. Dan & Andrew

Some final thoughts and tid bits:

CBS saved Nick and Tina’s marriage! Honestly, it was a sweet moment.

Where are Toni and Dallas? Maybe they had a passport issue? Hmmmmm.

Phil Keoghan should at least be nominated for next year’s Emmy Best Host category.

We’ll see you again Sunday, February 15, 2009. Stay tuned for The Amazing Race updates.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

Leave a Reply