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Contest #629: Martyr’s Mark, Broad Street, Oxford, England

To say that Henry VIII’s daughter eldest Mary was no fan of the English Reformation would be a significant understatement. Mary was an ardent Catholic, and upon ascending to the throne after the death of her baby brother Edward, immediately started efforts to restore Catholicism back to England and Ireland. These efforts included the executions of any who would stand in her way — causing her to be labeled with the nickname “Bloody Mary”.

Among the 280 religious dissenters burned at the stake included a pair of Anglican bishops (Hugh Latimer and Nicholas Ridley) and the Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Cranmer. These 3 men are referred to as the “Oxford Martyrs” and there is a memorial to them just down the street from this weeks location.

Latimer Ridley Foxe burning.jpg
By https://www.johnfoxe.org/woodcuts/f1805ins5.gif, Public Domain, Link

Martyrs Memorial Oxford 20050317.jpg
CC BY-SA 3.0, Link

The mark in the middle of the street in the contest image is the Martyr’s Mark — the location where the actual executions took place in October 1555 (Latimer and Ridley) and March 1556 (Cranmer).

Those who found it before the hint were:

  • Paul Voestermans
  • Martin de Bock
  • Walter_V_R
  • Garfield
  • Lighthouse
  • Phil Ower
  • hhgygy
  • Jean Noyau

And after the hint:

  • Gillian B
  • Andreas Meister
  • Robin
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Contest #628: the Bleriot ferry near Drumheller, Canada

This week’s contest was the ridiculously short Bleriot Ferry across the Red Deer River near Drumheller, Alberta, Canada.

The hint was in reference to the fact that the first operator was Andre Bleriot, brother of aviator Louis Blériot who was first to fly across the English Channel.

It’s 103 metres across, making it one of the shortest rides in the world. It probably took me twice as long to write this post as it does to cross the ferry.

If anyone has a spare ferry around, send it to me and we can set up a double ferry ride with no need for the ferries to actually move. Drive-on-off-on-off.

Link to short video of ferry

Those who took no time at all to solve the puzzle:

  • Paul Voestermans
  • Wakter_V_R
  • Martin de Bock
  • Garfield
  • Phil Ower
  • hhgygy
  • Eloy Cano
  • Lighthouse
  • Jeather
  • David Kozina
  • Rob de Wolff
  • Jean Noyau
  • Andreas Meister
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Contest #627: the Foreshore Freeway Bridge on Cape Town, South Africa

Construction started on the Foreshore Freeway Bridge in Cape Town in 1970, but stalled in 1977 and has not resumed. All that is there are two sections – a ramp up in the west and what is now a parking garage in the east. Several urban legends have surfaced over the years about the reasons why it was never finished. One is that the design team had made a calculation error resulting in the two ends failing to link up. Another was that construction was halted due to a disgruntled shop owner who refused to sell his property that stood where the flyover would pass. However, the official explanation to date is that the city had run out of money with traffic numbers at the time not justifying its continuation and the project had to be abandoned.

The hint referred to the vuvuzela during the 2010 World Cup Soccer tournament hosted by South Africa. The world’s largest (35 m (114.83 ft)) operational vuvuzela sponsored by Hyundai was mounted on the western side and meant to sound at the start of each game. The city council, however, decided not to use it as the jarring sound and volume level was a cause of concern. When one of your humble contest moderators read that, this reveal took a quick turn.

See, the moderator in question **HATES** vuvuzelas with a white-hot passion. He refers them to as “loser soccer horns”. He is a big hockey fan, and when these abominations show up at the rink, he loses all enjoyment of the game (and his favorite team invariably starts to lose, or, at least, win by less of a margin). Were it up to him, they would all be thrown into the pit of hell (from contest #184). The fact that the creators of this awful thing never got to hear it sounded as planned brings him no end of joy. But we digress…

FORTY YEARS!?!?!??! That seems like an excessive construction delay, n’est ce pas?

Found despite no end in sight:

  • Martin de Bock
  • hhgygy
  • Phil Ower
  • Garfield
  • Paul Voestermans
  • Eloy Cano
  • Walter_V_R
  • David Kozina
  • Rob de Wolff
  • Lighthouse
  • Andreas Meister
  • Jean Noyau
  • Robin Giles

No-one after the hint.