Where in the world is this place?

[SaabKen]

Apocalypse Now: Air Cav squadron of helicopter gunships attacking a beach in Vietnam ?

Correct

The location is Baler, in Baler Bay, province of Aurora, Central Luzon, Philippines.

Your turn

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[rpiereck]

I saw the BALEARIA boat and knew it was somewhere in the Baleares Islands, did a Google Search for port of Ibiza and found it.

Port of Ibiza in Spain: https://www.google.com/search?rlz=1C...PMLfsgaQmtSzDg

[rpiereck]

My new one:

[Dave T]

Easy peasy. This is Botafogo in Rio de Janiero. The slightly harder part is that the Sugarloaf or Corcavado statue is not in the photo. Is the Rio Sul shopping center in the photo?

New photo:
This airport was mocked as too big, too far, just like the airport in Campinas (near Sao Paulo..ha ha actually far away from Sao Paulo) and Mirabel, near Montreal. However, now it is like Dulles, near Washington, which used to be too big and too far away but now is a busy airport.

[SaabKen]

This airport was mocked as too big, too far, just like the airport in Campinas (near Sao Paulo..ha ha actually far away from Sao Paulo) and Mirabel, near Montreal. However, now it is like Dulles, near Washington, which used to be too big and too far away but now is a busy airport.

Wouldn't it be easier to just give us the three letters code ?

[Dave T]

Wouldn't it be easier to just give us the three letters code ?

That's called the IATA code.

White elephants include VCP, YMX. Former white elephants include IAD.

This airport is near (no looking it up!) LIN and in the same country as CIA.

[rpiereck]

Easy peasy. This is Botafogo in Rio de Janeiro. The slightly harder part is that the Sugarloaf or Corcavado statue is not in the photo. Is the Rio Sul shopping center in the photo?

You got it, I knew that one wouldn't be too hard!

I chose the photo specifically because it doesn't have either the Pão de Açúcar (Sugar Loaf) or Corcovado in the picture, hence making it a bit harder to identify. The photo was taken from the top of the Pão de Açúcar, and the Rio Sul is off the picture to the left. My mom's work is that tall black building right down the center on the Botafogo beach, and the Flamengo embankment, which my grandfather also built, is on the right side. To the extreme right, off the picture, is the Santos Dummont airport.

I once was assaulted in Botafogo beach by five guys, they shoved me off my nice mountain bike to steal it, I tried getting back on it, but they almost beat me up. I let them have the bike instead of getting bruised. That incident in 1992 (one of a few between 1988-1992) led me to move to the US, and here I am now!! Those were rough times in Rio. The situation is much better now.

Botafogo is named after the Portuguese galleon ship São João Batista, which was nicknamed Botafogo (which loosely translates as "the one that sets others to fire", or "set it on fire") by its crew. In English it would have been Spitfire, I guess. The Botafogo was built in 1534 and was at the time the most powerful naval ship in the world, and feared by many navies. It drew 1000 metric tons, and had 366 bronze cannons on both sides! The boat's artillery chief artillery chief, João Pereira de Souza, led the boat to many victories such as the conquest of the port of Tunis and many victories against the inferior French navy (back then Portugal had the world's best navy, always a sea faring country). When the artillery chief retired, the Portuguese crown gave him some land in the then newly discovered land of Santa Cruz (Brazil's old name), right in the Guanabara Bay, next to the then small town of Saint Sebastian of the River of January (São Sebastião do Rio de Janeiro). He named his newly acquired lands after his beloved ship, the Botafogo, and the neighborhood to this day bears that name, one of the oldest neighborhoods in the city.

Botafogo is home to the second best soccer and rowing club in Rio, Botafogo. The best soccer and rowing club of course is Flamengo, which is my family's team!!

Enough of Rio's history...

[rpiereck]

Yeah, no SAABs there. I mention to anyone in my family I own a SAAB and they look at me puzzled, they have no clue what car that is. A good friend of mine is a VW nut in Rio, owns three VWs. He asked me what kind of a car a SAAB is, I told him "like a Volskwagen, but better". LOL

And Brazil is the fourth largest car market in the world by sales volume now, SAAB really needed to start selling there. Too late...

[nordwulf]

This airport is near (no looking it up!) LIN and in the same country as CIA.

I don't know what CIA is but LIN is Linate near Milan. I flew in there a few years ago so I didn't look it up. The other airport in Milan is Malpensa. There is a third airport, I believe.. Or did I fly into Malpensa? I think I did. Code is MXP. A quick search shows that's the airport we are looking for. So yes, my final answer is Malpensa...!