Hop wants to use this opportunity to train up a bit, but he points out your eventual destination over in Wedgehurst: a building with a purple roof in the bottom-right part of town. That’s the Pokémon Research Lab!
Of course, it’s not as simple as just walking there like it was the last time you went through Route 1. Oh, no, there’s now a flock of Wooloo sleeping peacefully right in the middle of the road. You’ll need to “take the long way round” to get to Wedgehurst.
Now that you have a Pokémon, you can go through the tall grass to the right that was previously inaccessible. There are also wild Pokémon roaming around freely in the tall grass that you can see on the overworld, although you will also still run into random encounters in the tall grass like the old games.
| Route 1 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Random Encounter | ||||
| Pokémon | Types | Level | Rarity | |
 |
Skwovet | 2–5 | 50% | |
 |
Blipbug | 2–5 | 30% | |
 |
Caterpie | 2–5 | 15% | |
 |
Grubbin | 2–5 | 10% | |
 |
Hoothoot | 2–5 | 5% | |
| Overworld Encounter | ||||
| Pokémon | Types | Level | Rarity | |
|
Skwovet | 3–6 | 50% | |
 |
Rookidee | 3–6 | 30% | |
 |
Wooloo | 3–6 | 15% | |
 |
Nickit | 3–6 | 5% | |
You should also have 5 Poké Balls at this point, so you can use them to catch any wild Pokémon you run into. As with recent games, catching Pokémon will give you EXP, and EXP is now always earned for the entire party, similar to how the Exp. Share functioned in the Sun and Moon games, although with no option to turn it off. However, the EXP earned is proportionate around the Pokémon’s levels, so it shouldn’t get too out of hand.
There’s a Poké Ball sitting near the tall grass that you can pick up — it’s not actually a Poké Ball, but an item ball that contains items. This one contains a Potion, which you should already have three of by now unless you used one to heal.
Keep going along the path until it winds north, picking up 2 Paralyze Heals nearby in the grass. One handy feature is that, when you pick up a new item, it will show on the screen what the item does.
After all of that, you should finally be near the entrance to Wedgehurst.