Not long ago there was a Team of 10 competition at a geocaching event. In such a competition a team consists of 10 cachers and there are 10 caches (numbered 0 through 9) to be found. Each cacher is to find a different one of the caches, mark it, punch their score card and return to the starting point. Their times are totaled and the team with the lowest total wins. Fifteen minutes before their starting time the team is given a list of the 10 caches including their coordinates and descriptions. During that time they can plot their strategies especially as to who will seek which cache.
The winning team consisted of Abel Hunter, Barry Cash, Claude Hopper, Dan D. Hyde, Eunice Persons, Faye Dout, Glenn Walker, Heide Goodwin, Inna Stumpf, and Justin A. Bush, whom we might refer to by their first initials. Their winning strategy is described here. Taking into account the abilities of the cachers (height; size; weight; strength; durability; speed on various terrains; climbing, scrambling, swimming and culvert crawling capabilities; smelling out difficult hides; etc.), their aversions (e.g. to rock piles, heights, slippery slopes, stinky swamps, spiders, snakes, bats, ticks, mosquitoes, dead animals, etc.) as well as the descriptions of the caches (location, terrain, icons, size and difficulty ratings), it was soon agreed that Abel, Barry, Faye, and Glenn should pursue caches #2, #6, #1 and #5, respectively. For the remainder of the caches, each cacher estimated (in minutes) how long it would take them to reach each cache and return. These times were placed in the table below. For example, Claude estimated it would take her 3 minutes to get Cache #0.
| cacher\cache |
#0 |
#3 |
#4 |
#7 |
#8 |
#9 |
| Claude |
3 |
7 |
11 |
6 |
7 |
7 |
| Dan |
7 |
5 |
9 |
6 |
8 |
10 |
| Eunice |
5 |
9 |
7 |
8 |
5 |
10 |
| Heide |
8 |
5 |
6 |
9 |
9 |
3 |
| Inna |
6 |
2 |
8 |
10 |
6 |
4 |
| Justin |
7 |
7 |
5 |
11 |
7 |
5 |
You can validate your puzzle solution with certitude.
(added 5/22/2012: For BIG HINTS on all the Star Caches, look at The Stars