Title: “Nothing But Neighbors”
Prompt: This week’s contest answer is a landlocked country.
Answer: LAOS
Correct entries: 592

Sixteen countries populated last week’s grid. They were:

1-A: [Country where you’ll find the Mayan ruins of Altun Ha] = BELIZE
15-A: [Island nation in the Indian Ocean] = COMOROS
17-A: [Kahlil Gibran’s land] = LEBANON
22-A: [Sultanate in the Arab League] = OMAN
55-A: [Part of the former Songhai Empire] = MALI
63-A: [One of the Caucasus States] = ARMENIA
65-A: [Where many people speak Quechua] = ECUADOR
68-A: [1983 James Michener novel] = POLAND
1-D: [Its capital is Minsk] = BELARUS
3-D: [Its first president was Virginia-born Joseph Jenkins Roberts] = LIBERIA
10-D: [President Faure Gnassingbé’s country] = TOGO
12-D: [Count Dracula’s home] = ROMANIA
40-D: [Home of Red Stripe beer] = JAMAICA
44-D: [Country on the Adriatic Sea] = ALBANIA
46-D: [Site of the 1972 World Chess Championship] = ICELAND
56-D: [Home country of 2014 Fields Medalist Maryam Mirzakhani] = IRAN

Highlight those and you’ll notice that four single letters are completely surrounded. In clockwise order they spell contest answer LAOS, landlocked on both globe and grid. 592 right answers, so more Week 1-ish than my first attempt, but I’d say both were Week 1.5 or 1.75, which I suppose averages out to a proper Week 1 and Week 2. Such is meta-life.

omniart points out:

A bit of trivia that I always remember. There are only two doubly landlocked countries in the world (countries landlocked by landlocked countries): Liechtenstein and Uzbekistan.

And don’t forget the only triply-landlocked U.S. state. They have lots of nice rivers, though.

Rand laments:

This would’ve gone a lot faster if I had NOT consulted a globe!

Your fancy globe is useless against my geography metas!!

And finally, gpagano says:

Happy 650 Matt!

Why, thank you. 350 to go! Let’s get started on them now:

THIS WEEK’S INSTRUCTIONS:

This week’s contest answer is a noted work of art.