Ready to rock?
Lincoln City hosts a truly igneous treasure hunt for Labor Day
CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story indicated that rocks would be placed in Connie Hansen Gardens. This is not the case. The garden is open to the public and welcomes visitors, but not for treasure hunting.
Story & photos by Gretchen Ammerman
Oregon Coast TODAY
Have you ever been on a walk while you had a good grump going, came upon a rock painted with a random saying or pretty picture and had it totally turn your day around? That’s the feeling that the Lincoln City Rocks group likes to help get rolling.
Roughly four years old, the Facebook-based group is part of the growing trend of leaving decorative rocks in nature and outside of businesses. This Labor Day weekend, which begins on Saturday, Sept. 5, the group will hide thousands of rocks throughout Lincoln City as part of its “Spread the Love” program.
“I get super excited when I find them and I know other people do, too,” said organizer Shelley Shandra. “We thought this would be a nice way to spread a little positivity during these tough times.”
Though her hopes were high, Shandra kept her expectations low.
“I just started asking people if they wanted to be involved,” she said. “The response was so much better than I anticipated. We currently have 42 artists involved, but we’re still accepting more.”
Finders are more than welcome to take the rocks home with them; the only ask is that they post a picture of it in the place it was found. Or, if people take a rock home with them and re-hide it somewhere else, to post a picture from there.
“It’s so cool to go on our Facebook page and see people posting rocks that they have found in other places that have our Lincoln City Rocks information painted on them,” Shandra said. “We’ve seen ones that were found far away in other parts of the state and recently one was found in Arizona.”
The original goal to get 1,000 rocks ready for the special holiday distribution has been more than met.
“We passed the initial goal in three days,” Shandra said. “We’ve got over 2,000 rocks now and I’m confident we’ll finish with close to 3,000. I have a friend visiting from Connecticut and she’s even starting painting rocks.”
Each artist was asked to commit to decorating a minimum of 30 rocks and to hide them sometime over the holiday weekend. Some have said they will hide all three days, some only one day. But, either way, the distribution will be sporadic and unpredictable to keep things interesting. The group is also dividing up the town so that the distribution will be far and wide.
Creating, hiding and looking for decorated rocks is definitely a family-friendly activity, and welcomes artists of every ability. Though there are some talented individuals creating tiny masterpieces, a scan of the Lincoln City Rocks Facebook page drives home the message that finding one can brighten a day even if it’s been simply decorated with a single word like “love.”
“We’re hoping to flood Facebook with fun and beautiful rocks from Lincoln City that have ended up all over the country and maybe even the world,” Shandra said. “But the whole point is just to put smiles on people’s faces.”
The Lincoln City Rocks Facebook group currently has almost 3,000 members and always welcomes more.