Difference between revisions of "Locations"

Revision as of 22:14, 19 July 2009

The Quests are famous for their globetrotting adventures, covering locales both familiar and mysterious. As Peter Lawrence wrote:

"Intense. Photorealistic. Every locale is caught in its most dramatic moments. Every geographic, climatic mood pushed to its extreme. A world whose look matches—extends—the range, the sophistication and the drama of the stories. A world where a decaying urban centre is as exotic as a Himalayan mountain peak. Where a National Park forest can be as mysterious as the Amazon Jungle. Where the White House can be the domain of an extraterrestrial spy and the Everglades the home of a hitherto undiscovered band of Viking Native Americans. Arctic and Antarctic. Unexplored submarine canyons. South American jungles and Australian wilds. African plains. Russian steppes. Every corner of the world yields its mysterious secrets to Jonny Quest. But Jonny goes beyond our known world, exploring legends of the supernatural, of lost civilizations and wrinkles in time—finally entering the Virtual Reality of Cyberspace."

This page will feature brief coverage of each location the Quests visit, with longitude and latitude presented on the show (although these measures were often wrong; be careful). Paul Robison has contributed a work-in-progress Google Maps board for the Quests' destinations; check it out here.

Multiple

• Quest Compound
• Questworld

101 The Darkest Fathoms

Location: Bermuda Island 65.27W, 33.04N (1,080 miles)
Reality: Bermuda and surrounding areas
Myth: Bermuda Triangle

Mr. Avary and his crew explore for oil in the area, and are attacked by the Black Jack Lee Impostor, who safeguard the wreck of the Ivory Web in hopes of recovering its treasure. Dr. Quest comes with an investigation, exposing the impostor's plans; soon after, the wreck is lost in a trench.

Bermuda is a populated British overseas territory in the North Atlantic ocean. It's associated in popular culture with the Bermuda Triangle, a conceptual triangle with points at Bermuda, the coast of Florida, and the coast of Puerto Rico, and the subject of urban legends about ship and airplane disappearances. Though the rate of disappearances and crashes is the same for any other stretch of ocean in the world, the Bermuda Triangle remains a popular choice in disaster and paranormal fiction.

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  As seen from the Questor

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  A real-world image of Bermuda

102 Escape to Questworld

Location: Chicago, Illinois 88.03W, 43.82N (953 miles)
Reality: Chicago, Illinois

Jeremiah Surd plans to hold the city of Chicago ransom in 1978 with nerve gas; Race Bannon leads a SWAT team to stop him, resulting in Surd's paralysis. Years later, construction crews demolishing an old building accidentally release the nerve gas, causing Dr. Quest and Race to fly in to fix the problem as Jonny, Jessie, and Hadji try to track down Surd. Though Surd evades the kids, their fathers are able to stop the nerve gas.

Chicago is a huge city and the most populous in the American state of Illinois.

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  As seen in the episode

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  The real Chicago's river

103 In the Realm of the Condor

Location: Peruvian Rain Forest 74.64W, 1.84S (3,256 miles)
Reality: Rainforest
Myth: El Dorado, the city of gold

The Quests set out for the rain forest with Estella Scheele, hoping to find her lost grandfather and possibly the city of El Dorado, occupied by descendants of the Chavín culture. They succeed in their search, but Estella takes a native boy hostage, hoping to leave the city and return to collect the wealth of its gold. She'd foiled by Jonny's heroics, and the Quest team keep the existence of the city a secret to preserve it.

Rainforest are forests with extremely high precipitation and life density, accounting for more of earth's species than any other climatological zone. Most of the Amazon River winds through the tropical rainforest of South America, which hosts several tribes of indigenous people—some isolated from civilization at large. The legend of El Dorado also originated from South American legends, eventually evolving to that of a kingdom made from gold that a few foolhardy explorers struggled to find. Both isolated tribes and the city of El Dorado blend in the episode's story.

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  Rain forest from the episode

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  El Dorado from the episode

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  Rio Madre de Dios, Peru

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  Muisca raft, representation of the initiation of the new Zipa in the lake of Guatavita, possible source of the legend of El Dorado

104 Rage's Burning Wheel

Location: Cape Canaveral, Florida 81.24W, 29.31N (N/A miles), Moscow, Russia 36.21E, 57.11N (7,625 miles) Reality: Cape Canaveral, Moscow

Ezekiel Rage hijacks a space shuttle to manufacture a molecule in space that will destroy the ozone layer of the earth. Jonny and Jessie struggle to return order at Cape Canaveral's mission control, while Race flies to Russia in an SR-71 Blackbird to board a Russian shuttle with Natasha Rostova and stop Rage's plan. A climactic confrontation occurs on an abandoned space station, which crashes into the sea with Rage aboard.

Cape Canaveral is a headland off the coast of Florida, where Cape Canaveral Air Force Station and the nearby Kennedy Space Center launch shuttles and other spacecraft for NASA missions. The site allows missions to take advantage of the earth's rotation by launching eastward; the downrange area is ocean, reducing hazard of debris in case of accidents. Though Race goes to Moscow to solicit Natasha's support, he probably blasted off from one of Russia's launch centers—possibly Kapustin Yar or Plestetsk Cosmodrome.

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  Mission control in the episode

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  The episode's Russian launch site

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  A real-life photograph of Cape Canaveral launch pad 39A and neighboring pad

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  A real-life photograph of Red Square, Moscow

105 Ndovu's Last Journey

Location: Tanzania, Serengeti National Park 35.04E, 3.51S (N/A miles)
Reality: Serengeti National Park
Myth: Elephant's graveyard

The Quests journey to the Serengeti to take pictures of wildlife when an elephant named Ndovu attacks their vehicle. The elephant recognizes Jonny as a kindred spirit, and an old Masai tells him to accompany the elephant to the elephant's graveyard, where it can die peacefully. The Quests find it, but poachers did as well, threatening to kill them and take the ivory. Ndovu kills the poachers and passes on.

The elephant's graveyard myth is represented faithfully. The origin of the legend is unclear, but some believe it resulted from explorers finding group die-off sites with several elephant skeletons. They postulate that elephants, in lean times, may herd together to find easier food, and subsequently die in close proximity.

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  The park as shown in the episode

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  The graveyard as shown in the episode

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  A real-life photograph of the entrance sign to the park

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