A flash of white. A dash to a crevice behind a rock in New York's Central Park. A hidden envelope filled with cash.
I couldn't believe my luck.
In the blink of an eye I'd become the latest winner in the social media scavenger hunt that's taken the nation by storm.
In late May an anonymous Twitter user posting under the handle @HiddenCash started dropping envelopes full of money around the San Francisco area. According to the user's profile, the game was set up as a "social experience for good" and would be making stops across the country and beyond. The story quickly vaulted into the national spotlight and became America's favorite treasure hunt.
When I heard that New York City was the next destination, I knew I couldn't miss the opportunity to discover one of the highly sought-after white envelopes.
At 9:00am on Saturday, I started checking @HiddenCash's twitter feed. The first post came in at 9:04am.
I checked back a few minutes later and saw a new post:
I strapped on my running shoes in my apartment on New York's Upper East Side and anxiously awaited the next clue.
It came at 10:01am.
I sprinted down from my fifth floor walk-up and headed for the city's biggest garden: Central Park.
From the clue, I knew that I'd be searching around one of the park's many bodies of water. My first thought was to check "The Lake," located at 80th street in the middle of the park. I sprinted past a horde of runners and bikers, and started searching in the wooded area behind the boathouse. Time was running out.
I logged back onto Twitter and found a new clue, which had been posted a few minutes earlier:
My eyes were drawn to the circus tent in the upper right-hand corner of the photo. My heart was racing. I knew the spot.
Running southbound through the grass, I made my way to the "The Pond," located at the southern tip of Central Park. At 10:17am, the final clue came in and I knew I was on the right track.
Fatigue was starting to set in. I was sweating from the two mile sprint through the park. As I approached "The Pond" I saw dozens of other treasure-seekers scanning the bank of the water. The minutes were ticking by, and based on the responses on Twitter, I knew that some of the envelopes had already been found.
And then it happened. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed a rocky outcropping that appeared to have been passed over by the growing number of treasure hunters. By this point, there were hundreds of others looking around the pond. A man was sleeping on top of the rocks, and 10 feet to his left was a hollow crevice that had formed in the root system of a tree. I made my way to the spot, looking around first to make sure that nobody else had seen the white paper tucked into the roots. I reached my hand in, and pulled out a heavy folded envelope.
An hour and a half after the adventure began, I had the prize in my hands.
I'll find out how much money is really in the envelope when I open it during Fast Money on Monday.
—By CNBC's Michael Newberg