Category: Reveal

The islands in this weeks contest are in Lake Huron’s Georgian Bay. The circular house, also known as Table Rock Cottage, sits on the biggest island of the collection.

Canadian architect William Grierson built Table Rock Cottage in 1971 as a summer retreat for his family, per the listing. The islands were uninhabited when Grierson bought them in 1965.

As of contest week, the cottage is up for sale at the following listing:

https://www.georgianbayislandsforsale.ca/Residential/For-Sale/3050862-0/2Is3700-Table-Rock-Islands–Georgian-Bay-Ontario-X5577990

Found before the hint:

• Garfield
• Andy McConnell
• Martin de Bock
• Phil Ower
• hhgygy
• Paul Voestermans
• Andreas Meister
• Lighthouse
• Louis XVI
• Graham Hedley
• Bas van Limpt

After the hint:

• CuriousJM
• Eloy Cano
• Steve Jaycocks

In the fall/autumn, the Smiley Face becomes visible along Oregon Highway 22 between Willamina and Grand Ronde, after being hidden most of the year by the colour of the trees. Planted with deliberate care back in 2011, the Hampton Lumber Company designed it so the face was larch trees with the eyes and mouth fir. When the latches change colour in October, the Smiley Face appears.

It’s not often that only four players find a location but it just shows that we have to hide the trees in a forest to make it hard.

Found before the hint:

• Garfield
• Eloy Cano

And after:

• hhgygy
• Phil Ower

The Republic of Molossia, also known as Molossia, is a micronation claiming sovereignty over 1.28 acres of land near Dayton, Nevada. The micronation has not received recognition from any of the member states of the United Nations. It was founded by Kevin Baugh. On April 16, 2016, He continues to pay property taxes on the land to Storey County (the recognized local government), although he calls it “foreign aid”. He has stated “We all want to think we have our own country, but you know the U.S. is a lot bigger”.

Found before the hint:

• Graham Hedley
• hhgygy
• Eloy Cano
• Paul Voestermans
• Ashwini Agrawal
• CuriousJM
• Lighthouse
• Martin de Bock
• Garfield
• Phil Ower
• Andreas Meister

After the hint:

• Bas van Limpt

Completed in 1976, the Kyrgyz State Circus in Bishek, Kyrgyzstan was built with the intention of welcoming circus acts from around the world – but ended up seeing mostly those from Russia. It still functions as a circus to this day.

In 2009, a skating bear in the circus killed the circus administrator, dragging him across the rink by the neck. An animal trainer who tried to help out was also severely injured. This damaged the reputation of the institution.

Finding the right circus before the hint:

• hhgygy
• Eloy Cano
• Paul Voestermans
• Martin de Bock
• Graham Hedley
• Garfield
• CuriousJM
• Phil Ower
• Andreas Meister
• Lighthouse

After the hint:

• Ashwini Agrawal
• Andy McConnell
• Bas van Limpt
  

First, an apology. One of our contestants pointed out, quite fairly, that the hint was written without proper level of respect to the Buddha and those who follow his teachings. For that lack of respect of the culture and the Buddha, I seriously apologize.

By Doctor 17

This 55-meter-high statue of The Buddha was constructed between 2006 and 2015. The statue houses another 125,000 smaller statues inside it.

Those who found the statue before the hint:

• Lighthouse
• Eloy Cano
• Graham Hedley
• Paul Voestermans
• Phil Ower
• Martin de Bock
• Glenmorren
• Garfield
• Gillian B
• hhgygy
• LawnBoy
• Andreas Meister
• Andy McConnell
• Bas van Limpt

And after the hint:

• Ashwini Agrawal
• Steve Jaycocks

Muammar Gaddafi, near the end of his Libyan dictatorship in 2006, visited the city of Timbuktu in Mali as part of the celebration of the birthday of the Prophet Muhammad. While there, he inaugated a project to build a canal from Kabala to Timbuktu, a distance of slightly less than 10 km. $8 billion later, the canal opened, and it had major problems from the start.

The canal crossed grazing areas where the locals would shepherd their animals. Before the canal, when it rained, this involved leading the animals across shallow pools, a quite easy task. Two bridges had been built, but they were far enough apart to make the trek to them onerous to the locals. Now, with the steep, concreted (aka, slippery when wet) walls of the canal, and the fact that the canals went from dry to rushing whitewater rapids with the smallest amount of rain, a great many people and animals lost thier lives.

Those who found it before the hint:

• Lighthouse
• Eloy Cano
• Martin de Bock
• Paul Voestermans
• Graham Hedley

and after the hint:

• Ashwini Agrawal

By Pradiptaray

In February of 1952, the Crown Princess of England, George VI’s daughter Elizabeth, and her husband Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, were touring the British colony of Kenya as a stop on the way to a tour of Australia and New Zealand. On the 5th, they took a expedition into the countryside and after a long day of sights, stopped for the night at Treetops. Sometime that evening, King George VI passed away in his sleep, and at that moment, even though she was unaware, Elizabeth became Queen. She would not find out for almost a day, until her party arrived back at thier base in the country, Sagana Lodge.

Plot twist… This is NOT that Treetops Lodge. That establishment burned to the ground in 1957, and was quickly rebuilt across the road. You are looking at the replacement hotel.

One of our contestants, CuriousJM, mentioned that they highlighted the location in their blog, and I found it quite informative and well written — I highly suggest a peek.

Those who only thought they found this site:

• Lighthouse
• John-john Ken
• hhgygy
• Garfield
• Gillian B
• Paul Voestermans
• Martin de Bock
• Phil Ower
• Eloy Cano
• CuriousJM
• Graham Hedley

And after the hint:

• Andy McConnell
• David Kozina
• Ashwini Agrawal

In 1981, when the Soviet Union was near it’s peak, they built this location, a top-of-the-line, state-of-the-art venue for holding circuses. A capacity of 1900 seats, with a nearly 15 m ring, plus space for rehersal, animal storage, veterinarian offices, and, of course, clown makeup stations.

The place was extremely popular — circus troups from all over the world, especially the eastern bloc countries, flocked to Chişinău.

Then the Soviet Union collapsed, Moldova became an independent nation and adopted a market economy. Ridiculous hyper-inflation ensued and this little slice of circus heaven was abandoned.

Those who found our first ever trip to Moldova, all before the hint, were:

• hhgygy
• Graham Hedley
• John-john Ken
• Paul Voestermans
• Martin de Bock
• Andy McConnell
• Eloy Cano
• Garfield
• Bas van Limpt
• Phil Ower
• Lighthouse
• Ashwini Agrawal
• Heidi Ibrahim

It seems quite unusual to find a park based on Le Petit Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry in South America — but less so when you learn that Saint-Exupéry’s wife, Consuelo, was from El Salvador.

The layout of the park is focused on the seven planets (including The Earth) that the Little Prince visted in the book. There is also the plane that the boy uses to move between the planets.

Oddly enough, this is WOGE’s first foray into El Salvador.

Those who located the park before the hint:

• hhgygy
• John-john Ken
• Lighthouse
• Martin de Bock
• Garfield
• Paul Voestermans

And after the hint:

• LawnBoy
• Bas van Limpt
• Heidi Ibrahim
• Phil Ower
• Graham Hedley
• Ashwini Agrawal
• David Kozina
• Eloy Cano

By lachrimae72

Frank Lloyd Wright was commissioned to design something amazing for the weekend getaway for the owners of Kaufmann’s Department Store in Pittsburgh. Edgar and Liliane Kaufmann were nature lovers had a plot of land a couple of hours outside Pittsburgh that they felt was beautiful. Their son was an apprentice at Wright’s Tallesin Fellowship and had introduced the couple to Wright. When the cabin on thier property near the waterfall began to deteriorate, they saw an opportunity and approached Wright to design a house overlooking the falls.

After visiting the site, he gave took a slightly different approach. He designed a cantilevered house built OVER the falls. Each room in the house would not only be afforded a view of some of the falls, but the whole house would ring with the sound of the falling water (hence the name) and carry the energy that motion conveyed. The Kaufmanns HATED the idea at first, but eventually relented and allowed construction to begin in early 1936. That didn’t mean the drama was over — there were many, many differences of opinion between Wright, the main contractor, and the Kauffmans (and the engineers they hired when they weren’t sure the design was safe). The original $35,000 cost estimate blew up to $155,000 (about $3.5 Million dollars in today’s value) by the time the project was done in 1941.

Those who found the house before the hint:

• Martin de Bock
• John-john Ken
• hhgygy
• Paul Voestermans
• Phil Ower
• Garfield
• Ashwini Agrawal
• Andy McConnell
• Eloy Cano
• Bas van Limpt
• Graham Hedley
• Lighthouse

and after the hint:

• Robin
• Heidi Ibrahim
• LawnBoy
• David Kozina
• Andreas Meister
• Tamas Ny

Complements of contest #766, we have a single perfect score for this series. Congratulations to Lighthouse for a superbly played series. Close on her heels is Phil Ower with 19 points, and Martin de Bock, Paul Voestermans, Garfield, and Graham Hedley with 18 each.