European Highways Mystery Cache
The Rat: I have verified that I was looking in the correct location earlier today. The cache is gone. I think one has run a full life. Cache maintenance issues due to the physical hide, some ambiguous map information about city names and highway numbers, and heavy tree cover make this one a candidate for archiving. Sorry I could not keep this going forever, Philippe.
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Difficulty:
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Terrain:
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Size: 
(regular)
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Regular sized cache whose coordinates can be found with the puzzle below. All answers can be found on the web, or on maps you can find in libraries and book shops.
*** REMARK: THE CACHE HAS BEEN MOVED FROM ITS ORIGINAL LOCATION, AND THE PUZZLE AND DESCRIPTION BELOW HAVE BEEN UPDATED, ON APRIL 24, 2003. LOGS MADE BEFORE THIS DATE REFER TO FINDS MADE IN THE OLD LOCATION, WHICH WAS NEARBY ***
THE COORDINATES AT THE TOP OF THIS PAGE ARE NOT THE ACTUAL COORDINATES OF THE CACHE! YOU MUST DETERMINE THE ACTUAL COORDINATES BY SOLVING THE PUZZLE GIVEN BELOW. NOTE: NOT EVEN THE DEGREES AND MINUTES LISTED ABOVE ARE GUARANTEED TO BE CORRECT. HOWEVER, THE ACTUAL CACHE LOCATION IS WITHIN A 2.5 MILE RADIUS OF THE GIVEN COORDINATES.
The cache is a medium-size 6.5" x 4.5" x 3" transparent plastic (GLAD) container, with a red transparent lid. It contains a logbook and pen, and the following 10 random items when I placed it:
- 2 WheresGeorge dollar bills
- 4 little animals
- 1 smiley top
- 1 slinkie
- 1 compass
- 1 spikie smiley hanger
Feel free to trade if you like.
I used tennis shoes to place the cache, hiking shoes would’ve been more appropriate. The cache is not visible, make sure to cover it again when you leave. There is no poison oak at the new location (after 4/24/03).
INSTRUCTIONS:
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For each set of 2 cities FROM THE SAME COUNTRY listed below, find the European highway number connecting these 2 cities most directly. European highways are either Freeways or Tollways. Use ONLY the number that is preceded by the letter 'E'. Some countries use a second national numbering, ignore that one. The 8 numbers you have to find are all 2 digits long. As a check, the sum of all 8 numbers is 344.
The 8 2-digit numbers following the 'E' in each highway number you will find, will be called A, B, C, D, E, F, G and H, and are to be used to calculate the exact location of the cache.
CITIES:
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A) Veurne -- Aalst
B) Bolsward -- Den Oever
C) Vienne -- Beziers
D) Grevenmacher -- Niederanven
E) Pomellen -- Finowfurt
F) Breclav -- Brno
G) Melk -- Linz
H) Barakaldo -- Santander
CALCULATIONS:
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N = (A * B * D) - (G * H * E)/7 - (10 * A) - (2 * (F - C))
W = ((A + 1) * C) + (B * (D - 2)) + (E * G) + (F * (H - 10))/2
N and W will be 4- or 5-digit numbers. Divide both numbers by 1,000 and you get the decimal minutes for the cache location as follows:
N 37 nn.nnn (where nn.nnn = N/1,000)
W 122. ww.www (where ww.www = W/1,000)
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
[The best site to find the answers is www.]ivnzvpuryva[.com]