Solution: Seaside Holiday
Answer: HALONG BAY
Written by Zhao Yan
Teams are provided with 9 clues and 9 coastal locations on a map, so it is natural to match them one-to-one.
The first part of each clue describes a certain location. Teams will soon find that these locations do not match those indicated on the map; in fact, some, such as Manchester, do not even lie next to the sea.
Teams will now need to figure out how to use the remaining parts of the clues. The aha is to realise that each clue describes a city named after the location, but with a sea-related suffix.
A starting point could be to google some of the more concrete ones: la Casa delle Farfalle will point one towards Milano Marittima, while a 2016 film containing Manchester suggests Manchester-by-the-sea. These can be confirmed by matching the locations on the map.
To identify the remaining clues, teams can Google the locations with an added "at/by/on the sea", or look up the Wikipedia disambiguation pages for the locations, which will list other locations of the same name (including those with the sea suffixes). Many of the descriptions are excerpts from the Wikipedia pages of the locations, which should help. To help identify cities in countries where English is not the first language, clues contain words in the local language, which suggest searching for "on the sea" in the corresponding language.
The complete set of clues and answers is given below. Clues are alpha-ordered by city name.
| Clue | Location | Actual town/city |
|---|---|---|
| This northern European city of seven mountains is popular among German tourists in summer. Aside from the beach, visitors can also walk in the duinen (Dutch: dunes) or visit the aquarium. | Bergen | Bergen aan zee |
| The City of Arcades is a popular surf spot on the Pacific west coast, welcoming both professional and novice surfers all year round. | Cardiff | Cardiff-by-the-sea |
| Lying in a region known for its tulip fields and windmills, this seaside town in a Home County attracts many tourists each summer to its North Sea beaches. | Holland | Holland-on-sea |
| Located in the Grand Canyon of Europe, tourists flock to this très belle ville (French: very beautiful city) at the tip of the estuary each summer to enjoy the cool breeze on the Atlantic beaches. | Verdon | Le Verdon-sur-mer |
| Home to the Red Devils, this coastal town has become increasingly popular since the release of the eponymous film in 2016. | Manchester | Manchester-by-the-sea |
| Aside from being the fashion capital of the world, this stylish town on the Adriatic coast is also home to la Casa delle Farfalle (Italian: House of butterflies). | Milan | Milano Marittima |
| As the capital of green cape, this beach resort is located on the instep dello stivale (Italian: of a boot) and has a rock outcrop 100m off shore, featuring a number of large sea caves. | Praia | Praia a mare |
| Home to a regal Ivy League University, this village on the Pacific coast attracts many big wave surfers and was host to an annual contest for the unorthodox. | Princeton | Princeton-by-the-sea |
| Once known as Paris of the west, the residents of this saintly fishing village won't hesitate to greet you with a friendly "¡Hola!" (Spanish: Hello). With 30 miles of Pacific coastline to the south, sports fishing is now a popular activity among visiting tourists. | San Francisco | San Francisco del Mar |
Finally, teams need to identify each city on the map and index into the city name using the number of stars. Rearranging by the order given in the map gives the final answer, HALONG BAY.
| Map index | City | Stars | Extracted letter |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Manchester-by-the-sea | 5 | H |
| 2 | Milano Marittima | 8 | A |
| 3 | Holland-on-sea | 4 | L |
| 4 | Le Verdon-sur-mer | 7 | O |
| 5 | San Francisco del Mar | 7 | N |
| 6 | Bergen aan zee | 4 | G |
| 7 | Princeton-by-the-sea | 10 | B |
| 8 | Praia a mare | 8 | A |
| 9 | Cardiff-by-the-sea | 9 | Y |
The inspiration for this puzzle is a popular nickname for Halong Bay in Chinese: 海上桂林 (Guilin on the sea). The original version of the puzzle required teams to infer the final answer after extracting GUILIN, but that idea was discarded as the English moniker is less well known and potentially ambiguous.