The time has come to issue a warning: this entire series of caches will be archived between May 1st and October 31st, 2022.
Introduction to the Cipher Series
Enigma is the fifth in a series created for those interested in some degree in cryptology. It is recommended that one do these in alphabetical order, the entire series being Alberti (GC3TAT5), Babbage (GC3V0GV), Colossus (GC3VAFW), Doyle (GC3WTWC), Enigma (GC3X6T8), Flowers (GC41DHR), Gifford (GC6B6HE), Hammer (GC6BR6X), Information (GC6CAXY), Jabberwocky (GC6CY2J), Koblitz (GC6DFP0), Lewis (GC6DMYB), Michie (GC6E4GP), Newman (GC6ENZC), Oded (GC6FNDV), Painvin (GC6G245) and Quits (GC6GN8R). Some can be done independent of the others but, in general, information given and skills acquired in one cache will not be repeated in subsequent caches. We hasten to add that there is not necessarily any connection between the name of the cache and the type of cipher used therein.
When we scouted out this area, we wrote that the cache is in a “rural area with farms on both sides of the trail and with the sky as a huge part of the scenery.”
Specifics of “Enigma” - in Case You Didn’t Know
According to The Canadian Oxford Dictionary, an "enigma" is “a puzzling, perplexing, or unexplained thing” and, in that sense, it is an appropriate name for any puzzle cache. But, with a capital letter, Enigma was a German encryption machine which was, according to The Code Book (Simon Singh, 1999, p. 127), “the most fearsome system of encryption in history” and considered by Arthur Scherbius, its inventor, to be “impregnable.” The story of how the Allies managed to learn its secrets has been related in many books and documentaries and, with time, as more and more secrets of World War II are revealed, there will be more to come. Certainly there is no space here to give any sort of fair account of how the machine worked or how its secrets were learned. Consult your local library if interested!
“Enigma” - the Cryptogram
The “New Wrinkle”
To encrypt a message in the way we are doing in this puzzle, one writes down the alphabet across the page representing the plaintext letters. One chooses a “key word” - the word known only to the sender and recipient. Under the first line, one aligns the letters of the key word in order, omitting any letter which has already been written (e.g. for “elimination” one would write only the letters E, L, I, M, N, A, T, O) in order. One would follow the “O” with the next letter of the alphabet - P - and then write the rest of the alphabet in order omitting the letters already contributed to the process from the key word. This second row represents the letters to be used in the cryptogram.
An Example
We are going to encrypt the message “Cachers are meeting tonight at the . . . .” The message is encrypted as follows using the key word “satellite.”
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
S A T E L I J K M N O P Q R U V W X Y Z B C D F G H
And the message becomes: TSTKLXY SXL QLLZMRJ ZURMJKZ SZ ZKL . . .
What We Have Done in This Puzzle
To give you the “key word” we have provided a cryptogram using the process we used in Alberti and we have made it long enough that you should be able to decrypt it fairly easily. Then we have given you the cryptogram to solve in which the first sentence has been encrypted using the key word as in the example to reveal just what we did with the second sentence - the one which will reveal the co-ordinates of the cache. So . . . good luck!
The Cryptogram
The “Key Word“
XLI WIRXIRGI MW PIRKXLC IRSYKL XS HIXIVQMRI I IEWMPC ERH LIRGI XS MHIRXMJC XLI OIC ASVH EW XVEHMXMSREP.
The Co-ordinates Revealed
MV CLI BIVCIVAI GLMAL OWSSWGB GI LTFI EBID GLTC JWE IHXIZMIVAID MV RTRRTNI TVD AWSWBBEB CW OEZCLIZ AWUXSMATCI CLI AJXLIZ.
IZTAEWJ COCOW VEW LCGZW IIIVW CLKNM OCVMMWX CZOEW MBQWG DVSTH CBUIG LCIWFMO MWXYIIZ CZV IFAIB IVBWV IVCMV.
Other Notes
- The degrees for north and west are understood to be 44 and 078 respectively.
- Parking, we've said, is there, but that does not imply a parking lot; be careful.
- Please provide your own pen or pencil.
- The cache is large enough only for a log.
Check Your Answer!
You can check your answers for this puzzle on GeoChecker.com.