I snagged a couple of other goody huts as well, but we lost some island sites I thought we'd have a chance to grab, especially the one above Ivory Coast. (That one was out of reach before my turn started, the Chinese were almost there).
So when we got Monarchy, I flipped London from Great Wall (as useful as that might have been for defending our colonies) over to the Hanging Gardens. London is FAR behind on infrastructure, not even having a granary or library yet, much less aqueduct, but denying the AI's this cheap, useful wonder, along with potential grief saved on cascade, has to factor into its value. The Gardens offers a permanent 3 content faces in the city where it's built, acting as a second Cathedral for 300 shields, the temp continental benefit, the culture, and the stacking effect with other happiness items that can't be obtained any other way. It's a good buy at 300 shields.
With most of the islands near France now occupied, our ships and settler pairs had to wander pretty far, converging near the end of my turn at "Ireland" off the Babylonian coast. Two cities founded there, third settler in place and set to complete the Irish Triad, ensuring the entire island for our empire's use. This land is hopelessly far from civilization, but if/when we conquer the Babs and build Forbidden Palace over there, Ireland would come online as a useful colony. In any event, it's ours, for whatever that will be worth. The swordsman for Eire is over on the Chittagong island, having poked into a goody hut (got zippo), and looking around a bit, but he'll need a ride home soon.
Getting Monarchy (!) from a goody hut is quite a break. It gave us the Hanging Gardens, and I traded the tech to Joan a bit later for all her treasury (~500) and a French worker. She went into revolt and is now in Monarchy, which will aid her growth curve, but she simply had way too much cash and paid for the whole tech at 2nd-civ cost IN CASH. So I had to broker it, but nobody else could even come close to affording. Now if only we can keep Charis from spending the WHOLE reserve at the first chance
we'll be in good shape.
On the up side, Joan is now so broke, she can't even afford a rite of passage. She must have been milking India and China for millenia on tech and other stuff.
Babs researched mapmaking on their own. I suggest keeping an eye on them, they will make contact within 20 turns max, likely sooner. The other civs have our world map now (as if they even needed it, they are all over the dang place) so keep an eye on when to sell someone contact with the Babs.
In addition to securing Ireland, picking up Monarchy and getting us on toward the Gardens, I did a LOT of heavy whipping in our coastal towns on the mainland, and beefed our military up a goodly bit, including getting ANY troops at all to the southwest island. I switched Charis's Gambit Town over to pumping warriors, because if they don't have a massive garrison they're going to flip. Might flip anyway, but it's worth a shot. DO NOT spend cash down there. Maybe whip a set of walls, though.
There are sea currents north of Leeds. I was too busy to investigate. Still no sight of Rome. Running out of places to look.
The final thing I did was outfit two settlers at the end to found two of the Red Dot locations. Seemed like a good time, and we're past "optimal number of cities" long since, so might as well.
I don't like our chances at Ivory Coast. I fear spending a lot of cash over there then losing it anyway. It's quite difficult to hold on to luxury colonies on another civ's mainland (check my report from Apolyton Tourney Two at my site, regarding cities on the Indian continent). In this case, I think we're just too far to support that location. I'd have grabbed the island instead, even though the ivory is desirable. What good does it do to found a city that is most likely to end up in enemy hands. (We'll see how it goes, our neighbors there are the Indians, who also have stuck their necks out to grab the ivory). The only way I could see ANY spending of cash on that city to be justified is if we have in place a garrison of about ten units, a third of them bombardment, and some walls, with a reasonable chance to hold out against a dozen archers or half a dozen knights.
Let Ireland build walls, then temples or workers. Don't rush anything over there after we're out of despotism. Those cities are hopelessly corrupt. Let em build it one shield at a time. Maybe rush a harbor in one location, but again, only if more troops have been sent and the island looks well enough secure.
I cancelled all our RoP's, as nobody was paying gpt. No one could afford a decent price, either, yet all stayed polite after cancelling. Next player has run of what to do there, give in for pennies or hold out for pounds.
Despotism looks better for us, for the moment, than Monarchy. I figure, finish the Gardens before a revolt, and try to go straight to Republic (which nobody has yet). We could conduct an ancient war against Babs, but it would take all our effort. Our military is strong, but widely scattered, and thin on a per-city basis. We frankly aren't anywhere close to having an invasion ready, so it may be better just to swap to Republic soonish and move on up the tech tree.
One more bit of bad news. Joan's Paris is size 12 already. With us still locked at size 6, and not so much as even started thinking about aqueducts. That's going to become a major problem for us unless we start working on it soon.
- Sirian
We may still get the wonder we need most, but my gut says the odds are not good, since the cascade has not been broken. Still a bunch of turns left to go on it.
. Replaying my turn, I "only" blew 14 turns of production (19 till the Lighthouse if I switched like I was supposed to, 33 the way I did it, actually 31 but the colossus was 2 turns off)...and a Golden Age 
. If they cascade to the Lighthouse during Zed's turn, then we probably wouldn't have had a chance at it, anyhow (but since the player takes the first turn, we might have gotten the Colossus back on the next turn if it hadn't been eaten in the cascade already). If they get to it on Charis's turn, though, then it's entirely my fault.
happened a couple turns later:
