G.I.S.H.W.H.E.S. The Greatest International Scavenger Hunt the World Has Ever Seen!

g.i.s.h.w.h.e.s. (which stands for the Greatest International Scavenger Hunt the World Has Ever Seen) is a 5-time Guinness World Record breaking scavenger hunt hosted by Misha Collins that you can compete in from anywhere in the world (even from your own home!).

Thousands of participants from more than 100 countries build their own teams with friends or are placed on 15-person teams (of new friends!) and for one week, through laughter, sweat and tears (of joy of course), they acquire Items on a fun, inspiring and sometimes jaw-dropping scavenger hunt list. The team that scavenges the most items with the highest quality of submissions joins Misha Collins on an all-expenses paid trip to an exotic locale. All the other teams walk away with a heightened perspective on their capabilities, and memories of an amazing week. Prior Winners journeyed to Rome, a haunted castle in Scotland, an island off the coast of British Columbia, and a pirate ship in Croatia. This year the Winning Team will be joining Misha Collins and his favorite Spider Monkey in Costa Rica for volcanos, rainforests and gishwhes-style discotecking (we’re not sure what this is, but pictures will be posted!).

The Items are “captured” as videos or images and uploaded to this website to memorialize the annual Gishwhes experience and to supply the judges with something to judge. The more sublime and creative a submission, the more points awarded. Items range from the sweet and touching, “perform a sock puppet show at a children’s hospital” to the weirdly sublime, “a fully dressed storm trooper cleaning a pool next to a sunbather,” to the absolutely impossible, “get the word “gishwhes” written on something in space” (a team actually pulled this off!). You don’t need to be an amazing artist or social butterfly to win. You just need dedication, drive, a little creative thinking and a will to win.

We try to create a list that is challenging, thrilling and absurd. We like to see items that make us tear-up and laugh out loud. We like to have participants break out of their comfort zones, re-awaken their inner artist, and do a bit of good in the world. We’re proud to have broken several Guinness World Records including: the most global hugs, 108,121; most pledges to commit charitable Acts of Kindness, 93,376, which we did in partnership with our friends at the non-profit Random Acts  (www.therandomact.org); and of course, let’s not forget the prestigious Longest Safety Pin Chain – over a mile long! We’ve also: delivered thousands of items to the homeless; raised the money to completely furnish every room of a home for a wounded veteran and his family (we’ll be posting videos for this soon!); had a Mars rock named after us by NASA; made Christmas trees fly; and have been reported on by news organizations around the world, including Al Jazeera.

See our Updates Page for more details – and begin to prep yourselves as the Hunt is nigh!

gishwhes believes that “normalcy” is overrated and that true “living” can be found hidden under the rocks of community artistic creation, acts of artistic sublime public performances, and random acts of kindness. More importantly, we are all artists and have gifts for society no matter what our capabilities or talents. And most importantly, we at GISHWHES want you to know the most important thing we’ve learned in the past four years: it is almost impossible to make durable clothing from cheese.