Mapping Louden Swain...

Vision Quest was probably the best movie ever made in Spokane during the 1980s...ok it was maybe the ONLY movie made in Spokane during the 1980s.  Still it's a good flick and captured some great scenes of Spokane during that time period.

In the opening credits of the movie, Louden Swain-the main character-is seen leaving wrestling practice at Thompson High (North Central High School) and jogs to work at the Ridpath Hotel.  Using only the footage from the movie (via YouTube), we've recreated in Google Maps what may be the first attempt at recreating the jogging route Louden Swain purportedly used to get to work...and it's confusing as hell.  According to the movie footage it includes a jog through West Central (vacant Kendall Yards site is visible), the crossing of four bridges, and a run through the skywalk.  Given the sequence of the bridges it would require multiple loops through Riverfront Park.  Who knows...he was trying to drop a lot of weight to wrestle Shute.

• Check out the Louden Swain Jogging Map [Google Maps]

Comments

[Fitzcarraldo]

Great! I've been looking for good running routes around here.

[Rachel]

haha! that's pretty crazy. and can you believe I've never seen the movie?

[Bart Mihailovich]

Thank you for this. What a fun thing to do. Now I have to try and find my Vision Quest VHS because that youtube clip really made me crave a good viewing of my favorite wrestling movie (the only wrestling movie I know)