I'm extremely proud to announce the grand opening of Xanadu's newest -- and undoubtedly best -- canal.
The Fraggle Rock Canal is now complete, after no fewer than 100 days of tireless work by a small posse of dedicated Wurmians.
Here's a map of where it is.
Fraggle Rock Canal removes literally HOURS of travel time from central Xanadu to the east and south coasts and server borders.
From the center of the Xanadu map, on Pumpkin Lake, you can get to the east server border in under one hour, with good winds. From the center of the tunnel, it's 30 minutes.
It's an "ALL BOATS" tunnel. The canal is deep enough to accommodate the largest of ships, and the ceiling is high enough that you shouldn't find your head lost in the ceiling.
There's a two-tile, paved highway running for the entire length, ready and waiting to be catseyed and added to the Xan highway system.
There are lamps every 10 tiles to light your way.
It should go without saying that there are no veins blocking your path, and whole thing is fully strongwalled/supported from beginning to end. So, no ceiling collapses to upset your journey!
We're hoping the GMs will deign to give us "Heritage" status. But you never know with those guys. They may decide to collapse the whole thing for kicks instead.
From the western edge, you want to be looking for this bridge (Fraggle Rock Tunnel):
At the eastern edge, look for this:
Inside, this is what you should expect:
So who built this wonderful *cough*Heritage*cough site?
The original route was mined out four years ago -- by these people -- but apparently never completed before the builders buggered off to a different server.
It was a great route, but not ready for any type of boat, or even a wagon.
On July 7 this year, EnlightenedOne proposed the idea of making it into a proper canal tunnel.
Sadly, he never followed through by actually doing anything, but he did inspire several of us to finish the job left to us by our ancestors.
Notably, Thorinoakshield and Wulfmaer acted as de facto project leads. On a project of this scale and complexity, you need people who know what they're doing, and these guys do exactly know what they're doing. These dudes are the reason this monster of a job only took 100 days and not 200. They also knocked the crap out of countless rock tiles and metal veins, added supports, lamps... goodness knows what else!
Other than myself and my alt, the following people (in no particular order) contributed more hours to this job than it is reasonable to ask of a person to contribute:
Zethereal, Harthim and Frederick -- relentless, relentless miners. Seriously, you should have seen these guys bashing away at the stubbornest 20ql iron veins with no regards for their own personal enrichment. That takes love and dedication, and we salute them for it!
Snowtech -- not only did he mine out a goodly chunk of the canal and tunnel, he also donated a bunch of high-end picks to the cause. Brilliant! Knocked off at least two seconds per action for me.
Astlyr and Ironmaiden -- weird, vegan, hippy priests with an insatiable appetite for chopped vegetables and a penchant for casting strongwall spells. They're at least half of the reason the roof isn't going to fall in on your head on your way to the east coast. Kiss their feet and worship them.
Most of the gang met up today to knock the last 100 ores out of the last iron vein.
Thorin posted some pics in his thread and I recorded the moment for posterity with an animated GIF.
