VFYW: Suites Week!

For contest #323, we find ourselves in the land of "cool water" and erect dishes.

Heads up: this week’s post exceeds the space limits of Substack’s email service, so if you’d like to make sure you see the full contest results, just click on the headline above, “Suites Week,” to pop over to the web version. (This is what I see when the contest gets really long:

First up, our super-sleuth dad with three daughters is not used to being this high in the contest results:

Thanks for including my geology lesson last week. My wife and I drove across the army of caterpillars last weekend to visit Douglas, Arizona, where we stayed in the historic Gadsden Hotel. The view from our window was utterly dreary, but I did get a photograph of this Tiffany window in the hotel. Sort of a VFYW:

As for this week, there were lots of great clues. Those water tanks in the front are Sintex water tanks, and Sintex seems to distribute mostly in India. Also, the position of the guard booth at the entrance to the gated parking lot makes me think that cars have their steering wheels on the right, which means that people drive on the left. (This is a weak point, I think, because there are other ways to interpret it, and it may be my downfall here.) Finally, the angle of the satellite dishes is low, which suggests somewhere near the equator.

All of this made me spend the week looking around southern India, which improved my geographical knowledge. I had enough close calls in Bengaluru that I’m going with that. 

Of course, it could be Brazil, or Indonesia, but time is up. Thanks, I enjoy these competitions even when I don’t get them.

Another top competitor who is usually down the page is our UWS sleuth from Cali:

I feel like you’re going to show up at my door one day and demand the VFYW book back. I definitely haven’t been getting to the answer on some of these lately. In this case, the satellite dishes tell us we’re very close to the equator. I thought those water tanks could be unique, but they’re present in a lot of places, including South Asia and East Africa. I considered but ruled out Jakarta. This looks like India or Sri Lanka to me — that radio tower style being typical of both places. 

I’m going to go with Colombo, Sri Lanka, since the positioning is probably right.  So many clues but still a challenging one!

Here’s a couple from a reader:

Palm trees, American vehicles, lush growth. Must be Florida. I’ll toss in Miami, just for fun.

I was just down in Miami for fun. The VFMK:

Another reader squints at the top of the white building:

“Oh dammit,” I said when I saw that placement of the beagle over the name of the “SUITES” sign. So then I began searching for black water tanks on roofs. I had a nice time visiting all sorts of places online — Mexico, India, Venezuela, St Lucia, the West Bank, Someplace in Asia? Who knew there were so many places in the world that use this method of water delivery? I gotta get out more! But I can always count on the window contest to teach me something.

So, the vegetation seems Mediterranean-like: palms, Norfolk pine, acacia. And the cars seem newer. I could not read the writing on the blue structures under the cell tower, but I think the word has an accent in it, so I’m just gonna say Mexico. Maybe somewhere in Mexico City? 

Another goes with Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic:

This is a WAG based on the sky, the mix of palms and other trees and the preponderance of white vehicles. I recently spent two weeks in the DR on a guided birding trip and saw much of the country, including some truly remote areas in the high mountains. Contrary to my expectations that I’d encounter grinding poverty, the country looks to be thriving, and the average Dominican seemed to me to be happier than the average American. Our guide said there is no drug problem and no homelessness, and that mental depression is unheard of. He ascribed it to good rum and good music. Could be.

Another guesses San Diego — it’s not, but now I have this song stuck in my head: