(For the View From Your Window contest, the results below exceed the content limit for Substack’s email service, so to ensure that you see the full results, click the headline above.)
Highlights from this week’s write-up:
A nearby volcano that’s even more dangerous than the one above
A strange beautiful fish with the face of a dragon
Yet another funicular!
The VFYW chef trying to recreate one of the best meals he’s ever had — from visiting this area
Lots of touristy details from sleuths who’ve been here, including the volcano
Our super-sleuth in Brookline catches a typo of mine from last week’s contest:
I had the feeling that a Brookland-Brookline mixup was bound to happen at some point, so I chuckled when the San Diego bookstore beat was attributed to my fellow super-sleuth. I recall there being one or more correct-guessing sleuths based in Brooklyn, but I guess they are less active recently?
This got me curious about other place-names starting with “BROOKL”, and I found a couple in the US: Brooklet, GA, home to the annual Brooklet Peanut Festival; and Brooklin, ME — where E.B. White lived when he wrote Charlotte’s Web (inspired by life on his farm there) and Stuart Little. Brookl-ians of the world, unite!
Here’s a submission for a window photo that doesn’t quite make the cut, given its difficulty:
Maybe you can use it — taken from the historic Gasparilla Inn, 500 Palm Ave, Boca Grande, Florida:
We were just here for a wedding. It’s a fascinating, old-money place owned by a former US ambassador to the UK, William Farish (who married a DuPont).
This sort of place isn’t usually my jam, but it was fun for a couple of days. It closes every July-October during the “hot season” and has the strictest dress code I’ve ever experienced at a hotel anywhere, let alone in a sleepy island town.
On to this week’s view, our super-sleuth on the UWS is psyched:
OK, now we’re talking! The times when I instantly recognize the View are few and far between, but this is one of them. It makes me happy just to see this — and also totally envious of the sleuth who was there.
Another sleuth writes:
It’s the coastal town of Kii Katsuura, Japan.
No? Rats!
From a first-time sleuth:
I’ve been reading Andrew since the 1990s. I have never participated in this contest, but I think that photo is from the island of Faial in the Azores. My dad was born and raised there, and I have climbed that mountain. My family still has a place there. It’s not fancy, but it’s right on the water.
Here’s Brookline again:
This week’s view demanded some squinting, especially for the letters on the skinny banner on the left side of the photo:
I was fairly certain about six out of the ten letters — ??A?AN?URA — so I tried several plausible-sounding combinations until I landed on SHAMANDURA, which turned out to be the name of a diving resort in Egypt on the Red Sea, as well as a yacht charter company active around southern [redacted]. The latter seemed more promising, given the landscape in the view.
Our super-sleuth in Riverwoods is thinking the Caribbean:
Thanks again for posting the pic of my daughter last week — the whole family enjoyed it! This week was tough. I am pretty bad with mountain views in general, but add the tropical and I am doubly lost.
Good job disguising the flag with Dusty; that would have helped me a lot. I think the signage says “Amanoura”, which research says its a boutique jewelry shop with a few locations, including St Barts and Guadeloupe. Both are mountainous islands, but I couldn’t really match them up with our view, so I had to throw in the towel and take a WAG for Guadeloupe.
Chini circles the right spot:
Another newcomer gets very close: “It’s the boat marina on the island of Capri, looking toward Naples, Italy.” That’s the right country. And the mountain looming on the horizon? It’s identified by our super-sleuth in West Orange:
Hello Chris! I’ve been out of the game for a while — just too much to balance lately — but what a great contest to grab a history nerd’s attention. I’ll pin down the precise location of the window later, but if that’s not Mount Vesuvius, I’ll eat my Loeb Classical Library books.
From our super-sleuth in Ridgewood:
I had been complaining about the lack of Google Earth coverage in recent contests, but this time it delivered:
It’s truly eerie to behold Mount Vesuvius in this photo and think this is the same volcano responsible for the sudden death — yet haunting preservation — of so many souls in the city of Pompeii thousands of years ago.
Next up is our CO/NJ super-sleuth, who deserves a big congrats:
I have not been playing as long as some of the other, more legendary sleuths, but this week is my 200th correct guess — assuming it’s correct!
Looking at the view this week, I thought, “Huh, that looks like Mt. Vesuvius.” A quick profile of the mountain looming over the ruins of Pompeii (though from a slightly different angle as our view) seemed to reinforce the hunch:
I hope the view submitter had an amazing time. I cannot image they did not. Wowzers. I myself have been to Pompeii, nearly 40 years ago. As a dirtbag backpacker, though, I did not have the means to partake in the finer luxuries available in Sorrento and the Amalfi Coast. I’ll have to go back!
The Intrepid Couch Traveler also visited — virtually: “This week, I wanted to make sure your smart and beautiful sleuths have a full picture of the dogged dedication of your humble couch correspondent”:
Generating a much less placid view of Vesuvius is our super-sleuth in San Mateo:
I usually begin my explanation of the Reimagined with a description of the several clues I’ve found in the VFYW. This week, the obvious clue is Mt. Vesuvius. And what’s likely to be the Reimagined if the VFYW is a picture of Mt. Vesuvius? I imagine that the submitter snapped the following photo just a minute or two after taking the VFYW:
But perhaps a realistic volcanic Reimagined is too obvious. We’re in Italy, and of course the most famous Italian painter is widely considered to be Leonardo da Vinci. So how would da Vinci sketch the VFYW in his notebook?
Our super-sleuth in Berkeley draws from his vast knowledge of the VFYW archive:
Over the years, this window identification contest usually involves a window (with or without glass). These windows are typically stationary, though we’ve had rare instances of mobile windows, including one in a funicular, one in a Ferris wheel, one in an Airstream (or were there two? [yep, two]) — and, most controversially, the window in contest #175, which was in an automobile stopped on the shoulder of a highway outside the West Bank city of Nablus. We’ve had a plexiglass railing in a treehouse, and the occasional glass-panelled door, and sometimes we’ve crossed the threshold on to the balcony and dispensed with any pretense of a window.
But I think this may be the first time we’ve had a photo taken at the railing of a cliffside terrace, which must’ve been at least a dozen feet from the nearest glass (ignoring any wine glass that might be on the table behind the photographer).
Indeed, the VFYW this week isn’t from a window. Occasionally I have to bend the rules because it’s often difficult to find suitable photos for the contest: not too challenging, not too easy, and a whole host of other factors that change week to week. So, if you have a photo candidate you’d like to submit, please send it our way: contest@andrewsullivan.com. Horizontal photos are preferred, and make sure part of the window frame is showing. Please also send an image of the building with the window circled, which makes the contest go much smoother. If we select your photo, you’ll get six free months added to your Dish subscription.
Back to the “window” hunt, a previous winner in Milwaukee reveals the right city and building:
