Given the above here's a route that might be of interest to some of you
Amazing Race 31: Honestly We Didn't Expect This Season to Exist edition
START: Los AngelesSome things never change, but I think production will always, ALWAYS have a start or finish line in the LA area and I'd rather it be the start line and seen for five minutes than another subpar finish.
LEG 1: Singapore, SingaporeI never thought I'd be in a position to miss westward routes but here we are lol. Singapore is easily connected to LA and has enough to do, especially since previous visits had awful ratchet tasks, to warrant a fun starting leg.
LEG 2: Sylhet, BangladeshTeams would fly to Dhaka and take an overnight train to Sylhet, right before they're thrust into the tea industry. It's like the manual labor legs of TAR 21 except...only one instead of four yay!
LEG 3: Amman, JordanInitially this leg was going to be in Beirut (which incidentally is pretty safe though most of its sights warrant a night leg which I doubt production / insurance would go for
) but as it turns out Amman is safer and easier to get to than most countries in this region and yet has more going for it taskwise than Dubai or Doha [/shade]. We haven't had a 'traditional' Muslim culture leg, just the occasional Route Info, but I figure it's a golden opportunity to show the rich culture of the area. Teams would finish around sunset atop the Citadel...
LEG 4: Petra National Park, Jordan...where they're immediately told to leave <3. Charter buses would take teams into Petra, for a leg involving archaeology, ancient Jordanians, and of course, camels.
LEG 5: Freiburg, GermanyGermany has been visited in 8 seasons. Of those
- 6 have been in fall, and
- 5 have been in Bavaria
So why not have a summer leg in the Black Forest instead? Have teams fly to Frankfurt and then drive ~200km since that's now apparently possible in modern TAR. My kingdom for a cuckoo clock building Roadblock <3
LEG 6: Dakar, SenegalWest Africa we missed you!
Your standard urban Africa leg - wait...there aren't really any standards for this - rather, a leg basically centered in Dakar proper, whereas the next leg
LEG 7: Goree Island, Senegal...goes outside the city somewhat. There's definitely a trip to Lac Rose for a salt harvesting switchback (hopefully there are enough M/F teams where they can force all the women and one beta male to do it
) and then a trip across the city to Goree for what hopefully would be a better Detour / RI than what was found in TAR 6.
LEG 8: Porto, PortugalOkay, so this is only partially because of RRAE 2 but even if it weren't, Porto's got enough going for it and the last visit to Portugal is long enough for people to forget that middling TAR 23 leg (I mean an archery Roadblock? REALLY?), to say nothing of the previous visit to Porto itself.
LEG 9: Malaga, Spain / Gibraltar, UKAs it turns out there's a single daily bus from Porto to Malaga (and plenty of opportunities to travel via Madrid and Seville via bus) and judging from the past few seasons that's the kind of route planning that production goes for. While initially this was going to end in the Alhambra, I figured that it would be far more chaotic to have teams go back and forth from Malaga to Granada and end up in St. Michael's Cave in Gibraltar.
LEG 10: Tasiilaq, GreenlandFunnily enough, this would work but the race would have to be so ridiculously micromanaged (which...is like pretty much every other season nowadays) as to get teams there. Teams would fly to Kulusuk and then take a helicopter ride to Tasiilaq for trips to glaciers, dog sledding and various other outdoor activities.
LEG 11: Kusuluk, GreenlandThe time and cost spent to get into and out of Greenland pretty much requires two legs for it to be worth it. Somewhat more intellectual and cultural tasks to counter the previous leg (imagine that 'translate ancient Greek letters' task from TAR 9 but with the Viking language instead).
LEG 12: Minneapolis, MNInitially this was going to be Boston but while there are several ways to get to Boston for a final leg (via Dublin, via New York, via Toronto), the only international flights of note for Minneapolis are from Iceland and Japan and I doubt anyone would want another horrible penultimate leg in Japan lol. Tasks about books, the greenspaces in the city, running, and hopefully enough other stuff that they don't have to rent out a sport stadium.