XWord Muggles Forum

Wendy Walker wrote: ↑Mon Jun 21, 2021 9:23 am I Googled cities and distances on the Rhine so much in the past few days that -- judging from what now pops up at the top of my Google searches -- Viking River Cruises has me down as an incandescently hot prospect. My WAG was going to be GENOA, a (1) sail that (2) also has a city name.

Wendy, I thought of GENOA too!

FuminCuban wrote: ↑Mon Jun 21, 2021 7:20 am I said FJORD to complete the sequence of waterways. I like my answer better, but grant that I'm a sore loser.

There's always next week!

I'm Afjord that is incorrect, oh well, water ya gonna do...

Sorry couldn't let that flow by without making a pun.

Wendy Walker wrote: ↑Mon Jun 21, 2021 9:23 am I Googled cities and distances on the Rhine so much in the past few days that -- judging from what now pops up at the top of my Google searches -- Viking River Cruises has me down as an incandescently hot prospect. My WAG was going to be GENOA, a (1) sail that (2) also has a city name.

I was and am still convinced the answer is Genoa. That is all.

boharr wrote: ↑Mon Jun 21, 2021 9:39 am

gatogato wrote: ↑Mon Jun 21, 2021 8:11 am I cannot find any way to measure Bonn, Germany, and Basel, Switzerland as 302 miles apart. Being unable to get beyond that I did not even get to the point of trying to find the next step.

This was the only pair for which I could not match the mileage exactly (I didn't use Google Earth Doh). Fortunately, I just moved on, and when the others pairs lines up exactly, I figured I had Basel - Bonn close enough.

I should have done the same

I really wish I would have confirmed that part so I could have moved on and seen if I could figure out the next step.

I need to work on my Googling skills. I had Seline, Croatia and Bonne, France as my first pair of cities. I could not for the life of me come up with the other city to go with Lima. And the only correct body of water I had was Lake Michigan. I was the on the right track, just had the wrong answers. Congrats to all the solvers!

REMINDER - Please join in. If it's crowded and seems a mess, that's a good problem and we'll figure it out. C'mon!


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And if you want to ask me how I know, oh I’ll tell ya. If you really want to know.... with apologies to Ralph Kramden.

After finding all the different bodies of water, I saw "Panama" spaced out at 22 Across, and thought for sure I was on to something. Then found "Seine" at 16 across. So I deduced that I had to find another ocean, sea and lake. Nothing. But I just couldn't stop looking at those bright shiny objects. Making the leap to the three letter clues didn't fit the theme for me. Oh well. On to the next puzzle!

And did anyone else research types and names of sails? That took me down some interesting holes.

Wendy Walker wrote: ↑Mon Jun 21, 2021 9:23 am I Googled cities and distances on the Rhine so much in the past few days that -- judging from what now pops up at the top of my Google searches -- Viking River Cruises has me down as an incandescently hot prospect. My WAG was going to be GENOA, a (1) sail that (2) also has a city name.

Yes I can see your inbox and computer screen now, one invite to "Experience the slow flowing life along the Rhone, Rhine, Seine, etc as only a river cruise can provide....

Oh, and Genoa, that's just baloney...no excuse me salami.

T

Okay, way off. In my “twisted” reasoning, I saw the title, “A Sail of Two Cities,” and assumed a play on words with “A Tale of Two Cites” by Dickens. I had each of the two cities. The distances from Google apparently were direct line distances, not the distance if you were to take the meandering course, for example from Basel to Bonn by sailing the Rhine. Thus, the distances were “as the crow flies,” which is an idiom from “Oliver Twist,” another Dickens story….from there, I had nothing, so I just tossed in “idiom” as my Hail Mary. Oh well…congratulations to those who got the final steps that I missed.

Bob cruise director wrote: ↑Mon Jun 21, 2021 9:02 am Having grown up in upstate NY and having four years of trekking to Syracuse with our daughter, I drove by Utica a lot and went with Mohawk River as it is natural. And there are canals associated with all the other bodies of water so I felt going with one canal when there was an option, was inconsistent. That added more than a little time to the search.

Maybe not having local knowledge helped, here.

Two things:

• On interweb maps, Erie Canal seems the obvious choice, visually.

• Having sung Low Bridge (15 Miles on the Erie Canal) too many times when a twerp, I couldn't fathom another answer.

Joe Ross wrote: ↑Mon Jun 21, 2021 10:03 am

Bob cruise director wrote: ↑Mon Jun 21, 2021 9:02 am Having grown up in upstate NY and having four years of trekking to Syracuse with our daughter, I drove by Utica a lot and went with Mohawk River as it is natural. And there are canals associated with all the other bodies of water so I felt going with one canal when there was an option, was inconsistent. That added more than a little time to the search.

Maybe not having local knowledge helped, here.

Two things:

• On interweb maps, Erie Canal seems the obvious choice, visually.

• Having sung Low Bridge (15 Miles on the Erie Canal) too many times when a twerp, I couldn't fathom another answer.

I want to hear Al's take on this. Hopefully he will be there tomorrow night

Wendy Walker wrote: ↑Mon Jun 21, 2021 9:23 am I Googled cities and distances on the Rhine so much in the past few days that -- judging from what now pops up at the top of my Google searches -- Viking River Cruises has me down as an incandescently hot prospect. My WAG was going to be GENOA, a (1) sail that (2) also has a city name.

Maybe the cruises would replace golf shoes for me. I bought a pair on line and all I see now are ads for golf shoes.

SReh26 wrote: ↑Mon Jun 21, 2021 9:57 am For those smarting from the meta, or otherwise seeking a mood boost on a Manic Monday, may I recommend the wsj Monday crossword, which can be done in 9 minutes and seven seconds?

... or in 7 mins 44 seconds

I hear cruises are great for doing puzzles on

I was convinced we’d need to do a “sounds like” switch at the end (SAIL instead of TALE). RHINE to LINE (which also anagrams to NILE!) in the first long answer dragged me down that and other rabbit holes. Ugh.

hcbirker wrote: ↑Mon Jun 21, 2021 10:00 am And did anyone else research types and names of sails? That took me down some interesting holes.

Yep, I tried Genoa in some many different ways, but also realized that the answer had to be simpler than that

gatogato wrote: ↑Mon Jun 21, 2021 8:11 am I cannot find any way to measure Bonn, Germany, and Basel, Switzerland as 302 miles apart. Being unable to get beyond that I did not even get to the point of trying to find the next step.

I wasted a lot of time on that, too. I kept questioning whether I had the correct cities. The closest I got was 307 miles by adding up navigable distances along the Rhine.

This puzzle reminds me of my favorite Italian author (Alessandro Manzoni), who used to say "Del senno di poi ne son piene le fosse". Its translation ("the pits are full of hindsight") does not do real justice to the original meaning, but you get the point. Kudos to the solvers, especially the ones on page 1!