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White to move and mate in two #622 — Mykonos, part 2 [1]

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Date: 2025-02-03

Last week, part 1 of my Mykonos experience left off with my boss back in Boston suggesting I take a few days off and go visit one of the Greek islands:

White to move and mate in two #619 — Mykonos, part 1

This was back in 1984 or so, and if you were travelling for business you flew either business class or full fare economy, in case you had to change your ticket at the last minute, which was usually the case when you're supporting customers you sold your high-priced gear to. And you were also put up in the best hotels, which in this case was the 5-star Intercontinental Hotel in Athens. But this was not my style at all. On my second night there I ran into a nice American couple that were on their honeymoon, and they took me back to their 2-star fleabag that had a rooftop bar overlooking all of Athens. It was spectacular, and a lot more my kind of hotel — say bye bye to "Would sir like a towel for the pool?", and "Hello, roaches!" instead (the cockroaches in Greece are like 5 times bigger than what we have in North America). So I had checked out of the Intercontinental and into theirs, saving Raytheon a lot of money, but of course they could care less. I have a bit of a reputation for not staying in hotels my company has booked me into, or at least, not staying in the room they booked. But that story will have to wait for another day.

After my trip to the Olympic Airways head office to 'fix' their installation I headed straight to Athens Airport to book a trip to a Greek island, but I had not a clue which one. At the Olympic Airways ticket desk, the agent gave me a few choices and I opted for two days in Corfu. I also re-booked my flight back to Amsterdam. My flight to Corfu was pretty early, like 8:00 the next morning. So I found a decent restaurant near where I was staying, extended my stay for a few days more for when I came back from Corfu, had a few beers up on the rooftop, and turned in early because I had to be at the airport like 6:30 the next morning.

Unlike the international terminal at Athens Airport, which at that time was — let's just say — adequate, the domestic terminal was like an imaginary scene from the 9th circle of hell. There was a big circle of gates, and there were no queues for each gate like there should have been. Rather, it was just a seething mass of people all trying to get ahead of one another, with a mob converging on each gate. Close to the time my gate was about to close, I had managed to get near the front of the crowd, and was even helping other people get their luggage onto the belt just to get them out of my way. When I finally got my turn, the check-in agent looked at my ticket and said: "Oh, you're at the wrong gate. Yours is over there across the way". I looked at where she was pointing, and there were no people at all over there because... the gate had just closed and I had missed my flight. So I sheepishly returned to the Olympic Airways ticket desk, and missing that flight turned out to be one of the best things that ever happened to me.

To be continued...

And now, on to tonight's puzzle. Below are links to an on-line board to help you work the puzzle, and the solution. But don't peek at the answer until you've made an honest attempt to solve the puzzle, or you'll spoil the fun!

On-line board

Solution

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