A fan from our Forum thought it might be fun to take the idea of the Traveling Gnome Prank and have a variation that involved a CEC doll. We agreed, and one of SP.com's most popular events was born!

In order to make our Chuck unique (and to prove it was actually the SAME one that traveled to all these places) we had to customize an existing plush. A hand-sewn traveling shirt was made for him, he was adorned with a SP.com logoed shoe, and he held miniature pieces of vintage merch (an original 1977 PTT menu, and a 1981 ShowBiz vinyl record). His journey began at CheeseVention 4, and was to travel the country from fan to fan, until he ultimately ended his journey at CheeseVention 5 in 2008!

Our "Travel Chuck" successfully made it to several states and visited many famous and bizarre places before his travels hit a snag. He was delayed in Virginia for several months, and it took quite an effort to get him back in the hands of the community. He did make it to TX where a little story was made up to explain his absence. After some photos were taken, he was shipped directly to our CV hosts so he could be at CheeseVention 5 as planned.

He never made it.

How he got lost in the mail we'll never know. How he ended up in New York we'll never know. How that person in New York decided that he was worth putting on eBay to try to sell, again, we'll never know! In a prime example of how small this world really is, we did manage to get him back. By chance a community member found him on eBay, and $40 later he's back in our possession. He is now retired from traveling, but will continue to make appearances at future CheeseVentions.

On another bizarre footnote, Chuck E. Cheese's released a limited edition plush in 2009 called "Tourist Chuck" which has an uncanny resemblance to our very own Travel Chuck, and the fact that he's supposed to be a tourist makes it even more curious. Coincidence? Blatant parody? There's lots of room for speculation here (read: they totally ripped off our idea!)

You can see all of Travel Chuck's adventures by checking out the 2007 Travel Log!!