Topic: Locations

[apskip]

Another pretty popular (and easy) port in south India is Bangalore (also known as Bengaluru) -- it's in Karnataka, and there are regular bus/train connections from Bangalore to all cities south of it.

moox03, maybe there's something wrong with my glasses. However,  Bangalore is 200 miles from the Laccadive Sea to the west and 200 miles from the Bay of Bengal to the east. You cannot get any further from the coast at any other other large city at that latitude or further south in India! Bangalore is a huge metropolitan area with major economic development and a major airport, but a port it's not.

[apskip]

I have been doing some simple arithmetic on various combinations regarding the route. Here are my conclusions:

1. You can get to 64% with 7/11ths. This means that there would have to be 4 places from previous usage. Those would have to be:

Los Angeles
Amsterdam
somewhere in Africa choosing from Senegal(most likely), Morocco, Tunisia, Egypt, or Tanzania, assuming that anything south of Burkina Faso makes no sense
the UNKNOWN LOCATION, for which I have provided a list of potential countries but like Russia or China the best; that means Moscow, Beijing, Xian, Shanghai, or Hong Kong if I am correct

2. The 7 new places would have to be:

Ireland
Burkina Faso
Dubrovnik
Vilnius
Osaka
Taipei
Girdwood

3. See the Speculative Timelines thread for details. The number of TBCs is now 0 at the beginning and 0 at the end. Logic dictates that one of the legs in my timeline must be a TBC.

[apskip]

I feel like I am in the middle of the movie 1776 now when the names of the states are on the board and are being rammed to the left or to the right as they vote for or against Independence. After sleeping on this, I have come up with what I think might be the only possible resolution of the 65% rule issue:

Girdwood was part of the AR9 "deliver medical supplies to a remote village" DETOUR, but bad weather prevented any team from taking it. They all had to go ice fishing instead. In the mind of van Munster, Girdwood must count as a Previous Place. Alternatively, the FINISH LINE may actually be in Anchorage, which clearly is a Previous Place.

If so, then we rebalance the sides of the ledger and still retain 7/11ths or 64% NEW places with the addition of the second African place and the subtraction of Girdwood from the NEW column.

[puddin]

I feel like I am in the middle of the movie 1776 now when the names of the states are on the board and are being rammed to the left or to the right as they vote for or against Independence. After sleeping on this, I have come up with what I think might be the only possible resolution of the 65% rule issue:

Girdwood was part of the AR9 "deliver medical supplies to a remote village" DETOUR, but bad weather prevented any team from taking it. They all had to go ice fishing instead. In the mind of van Munster, Girdwood must count as a Previous Place. Alternatively, the FINISH LINE may actually be in Anchorage, which clearly is a Previous Place.
If so, then we rebalance the sides of the ledger and still retain 7/11ths or 64% NEW places with the addition of the second African place and the subtraction of Girdwood from the NEW column.

Anchorage as the finish line? I'm not buying it.

[TARAsia Fan]

I would think LA would be the finish line, but you never know.

[puddin]

I would think LA would be the finish line, but you never know.

Thats what I think too TARAfan -right back where they started.

[Kogs]

I would think LA would be the finish line, but you never know.

Thats what I think too TARAfan -right back where they started.

any1 up for calling the playboy mansion 

[moox03]

by port i meant it generally (ie port of call), but yes, it is an airport (BLR) not a seaport

[apskip]

TALES FROM THE FLIGHTS

I appreciate your desire for AR12 to follow a traditional path back to the lower 48, puddin. There is one way that it could have happened, but that requires you to either disbelieve the certainty of Peach's findings about when fliming occurred at Girdwood or to believe that the FINISH was close to midnight on July 29 in Los Angeles.

The  easy way is if teams left Taipei much earlier than anticipate, specifically at 0345 on July 28 on CI 11, landing at ANC at 0630 on July 28. That would give them less than 18 hours to do what has to be accomplished in Alaska and then on to AS942 departing at 1220 July 29 nonstop to LAX arriving at 0627.

The hard way is for teams to arrive in Anchorage as planned at 0915 on July 29, do what has to be done in 4.5 hours(include a 77 mile roundtrip from Ted Stevens International Airport to Girdwood), and  get AS94 departing to Seattle at 1355, connecting there to AS410 and arriving LAX 2120. There are about 2.5 hours left before midnight and it would be a truly historic late-night FINISH LINE. This option has a total incredulity about it.

The earlier arrival actually is feasible if all the timeline is pushed back accordingly. My difficulty is believing that Peach's information was not correct(which I don't).

[apskip]

On we go. I have previously cited 3 different favorite cities, Moscow, Beijing and Shanghai, for the 7th leg UNKNOWN location between Vilnius and Osaka. Here are the relevant flight details so you can get an idea of the pros and cons of each one:

July 22 FROM VILNIUS
To Moscow (SVO) TE338/TE407 departs VNO 1020 connects in KIEV, arrives 1545
                          LO7721/LO627 departs VNO 1145 connects WARSAW arrives 2005

To Beijing (PEK) OS834/OS63 departs VNO 1510 connects VIENNA arrives 1125 +1
                        TE1138/AY51 departs VNO 1805 connects HELSINKI arrives 1150 +1  
                   BT115/SK995 departs VNO 1820 connects COPENHAGEN arrives 1155 +1

To Shanghai (PVG) TE420 1130 1300 connects FRANKFURT MU220 departs 1420 arrives 0700 +1  Alternative later flight is LH727 1735 0955 +1

July 24
FROM SVO to OSAKA AY154/AY77 1255 0845 +1

FROM PEK to OSAKA 5 flights from 0920 to 1620 departure arriving about 0340 later(2 hour 40 minute flight plus one hour time change)

FROM PVG to OSAKA between the time range of 850am to 2020, there is at least one flight every hour except none between 1325 and 1655 arriving about 0300 later (flight is 2 hours plus one hour time change).

The conclusions that can be drawn from this analysis is the total time to get through the 2 legs(including time zone changes) since the time zones between Vilnius and Osaka are the same for each combined route there. I get approximately 25 hours through Moscow, 24 hours through Beijing and 22 hours through Shanghai(despite the fact that from Vilnius that route went back to Frankfurt before moving east). It looks to me that in a shortened race preference will go to the most efficient route. That would be through Shanghai, but we'll see if that's the way that AR12 actually goes.

One thing that I am convinced of is that the alternatives to the south (all Indian cities, Bangkok, Singapore, etc.) are too costly in extra time to have been used in a race that was in a hurry.

[gingerman28]

One of the quoted interviews mentions that the teams visit six continents.  So where is the South American leg?   After Alaska?  Adding the time needed could bring the final mat back around the first week of August as we speculated early on.

Lima, Peru perhaps?

[puddin]

Its only 21 days, so says BVM Gman -- we can barely fit the end city after Girdwood never mind South America.

[apskip]

To borrow from my post yesterday at 651 pm, "I get approximately 25 hours through Moscow, 24 hours through Beijing and 22 hours through Shanghai". Since we now know that none of these will be the UNKNOWN location since they aren't in India, let's take a look at comparabale data for the major Indian cities previous visited by Amazing Races:

Delhi 28 hours
Mumbai 30 hours
Chennai 37 hours
Kolkata 37.5 hours

As you can see, all of these are quite a bit more than for any of the ones above. However, despite the need for extreme efficiency in air travel to get from west to east, World Race Productions set a course that most likely included one of the 4 Indian cities above. It would appear that Delhi or Mumbai have the edge. The actual flights are:

July 22 VILNIUS FRANKFURT TE420 1130 1300 connecting to LH760 dep. 1345 arr. DELHI 0225 +1 Alternate flight AI131 dep. FRA 1615 arr. DEL 0745 +1

July 24 DELHI OSAKA AI314 depart 2315 arrive 1235 +1


July 22 VILNIUS FRANKFURT TE420 1130 1300 connecting to LH756 dep. 1340 arr. MUMBAI 0100 +1

July 24 MUMBAI OSAKA AI314 departs 2025 (2 stops) arrives OSAKA 1235 +1

The above are not the only possible flights, but they are the only efficient ones. Other flight connections involve considerably more time.
I have flight information on Chennai and Kolkata, but don't feel it is worthwhile to show it since they are quite unlikely.
I (and several other RFF Detectives) am now seeking information that will help determine which city in India was chosen.

[gingerman28]

It must be somewhere, but I'm too lazy to search all the threads, but do we have firm, absolute, confirmed sighting in Osaka? Or is this just speculation?

[georgiapeach]

G-Man: Puddin is doing a beautiful job keeping all of our facts updated in one place so all of us can keep up here:

http://forum.realityfanforum.com/index.php/topic,12520.msg193237.html#msg193237

And Osaka so far is based on 3 vidcaps from the promo...

[georgiapeach]

Guess we should talk about this here now?

Continuing the discussion from speculation:

More interview evidence for another African country...

http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/movies/article/0,2792,DRMN_23_5735396,00.html

30,000 miles are covered by the winning team in this year's race.

5 countries where The Amazing Race had never been will be featured in this season's trek, including Ireland, Lithuania and Croatia. Other locales include Burkina Faso, West Africa, and Taiwan.

[Slowhatch]

I read that as one phrase/place: "burkina faso, west africa."

[gingerman28]

I read that as one phrase/place: "burkina faso, west africa."

The man in the blue head wrap or tagulmust is a Tuareg,  Sahara desert nomads most prevelent in Burkina Faso, Algeria, Libya, Mali and Niger.  They roam the desert on white camels.  So this must go with our Burkina Faso site.

[apskip]

GMAN, why must it go with the Burkina Faso site? You named 3 countries each of which is a valid possibility. First would be Niamey, Niger, which I have previously cited as the best possibility. Mali has Timbuctu, the fabled outpost in the Sahara. Algeria is a large country with several possible places.

[puddin]

reposting this here:
From the Jonathan Littman interview: (thanks to Slowhatch)
Littman:
*"We're going to a couple of places that I don't even know where they are on the map. I've had to go look them up."
CBS Press:
  *This season, teams will travel approximately 50,000 miles (or is that 30,000?), covering five new countries including Ireland, Lithuania and Croatia. 

*This year's race includes stops in Croatia, Burkina Faso and Alaska and features the first-ever Goth team. --ocregister

RTVW
*Ireland is one of five new countries The Amazing Race 12 filmed in, along with Croatia, Lithuania and two African countries with names that van Munster said most people can't pronounce.
*"It's very exciting to go to new locations because we have gone to places where people have never seen a television camera or have never seen television"
*The Amazing Race 12's course will span approximately 30,000 miles in 21 days, making it one of the shortest courses in the show's 12 seasons

ocregister
*This year's race includes stops in Croatia, Burkina Faso and Alaska and features the first-ever Goth team.
rockymountainnews
*5 countries where The Amazing Race had never been will be featured in this season's trek, including Ireland, Lithuania and Croatia. Other locales include Burkina Faso, West Africa, and Taiwan.

AOL
*The show will crisscross the world, from Holland to India to Croatia, and head to a few off-the-beaten-track towns that will send viewers grabbing for their globes.
*"There are probably four places that the average person is going to hear and say, 'They're going where?' And they're going to have to get out a map to know where it is. They are very remote," said Bertram Van Munster, the other half of the executive producing team. "We hit most of the continents, except Antarctica."

[apskip]

PHIL KEOGHAN: 30000 miles in 11 legs! That tells us much of what we needed to know to finish off the Timeline and locations.

Please see my analysis in the Timeline Speculation thread. The summary of it is:

1. The two TBCs will be between Burkina Faso and Niger and Taiwan and Alaska
2. Niamey Niger is the 3rd pitstop.
3. The 4th pitstop is Florence Italy, possible due to the time slot from the African TBC.
4. The 7th pitstop will be Jaisalmer India.
5. There will be have to be a leg in Osaka because the count of legs doesn't work otherwise(if you assume that it is a 21 day race that ends in Alaska). It will be the 8th pitstop.
6. The second TBC will go between Taipei and Alaska since there is no desire to go below 3 teams.
7. Everything else is unchanged.

[gingerman28]

PHIL KEOGHAN: 30000 miles in 11 legs! That tells us much of what we needed to know to finish off the Timeline and locations.

Please see my analysis in the Timeline Speculation thread. The summary of it is:

1. The two TBCs will be between Burkina Faso and Niger and Taiwan and Alaska
2. Niamey Niger is the 3rd pitstop.
3. The 4th pitstop is Florence Italy, possible due to the time slot from the African TBC.
4. The 7th pitstop will be Jaisalmer India.
5. There will be have to be a leg in Osaka because the count of legs doesn't work otherwise(if you assume that it is a 21 day race that ends in Alaska). It will be the 8th pitstop.
6. The second TBC will go between Taipei and Alaska since there is no desire to go below 3 teams.
7. Everything else is unchanged.

and the fifth and sixth pit stop?

[apskip]

GMAN: "Please see my analysis in the Timeline Speculation thread." The detail is there too and I highly recommend that you visit there. The KeepItSimple summary to answer your question is 5th Dubrovnik, 6th Vilnius.

[puddin]

I just knew that was coming Gman .

heres the link ~

Timeline Speculation thread

[puddin]

maybe we can narrow this down? Best I can tell the monsoon's started early July.

BVM:The monsoon in India is really going to kind of put a damper on things and kind of makes it very humorous.