When I couldn’t find my cache this morning I realised I needed someone smart to help me so I checked in with the well published Nikola Tesla. Nikola was one of the first people I met in Belgrade and he's been a favourite ever since. I asked if he knew where it was. He smiled at me with that enigmatic smile of his and said I needed to work it out for myself but that maybe I should start looking about 1.34km away.
So I started walking around in circles, pondering Nikola Tesla’s advice but couldn’t think over the sound of my tummy rumbling. I remembered back in August I met a Balkan Craftsman who sold me some particularly tasty caramel so I called past his shop to pick up a box or two for my journey. As it turns out, he’d seen me out drinking last night with Tito, about 0.89kms from his shop and he said that I’d shown him my cache so I definitely had it with me then.
Of course I thought, Tito - it was all coming back to me now. Maybe I’d left the cache with Tito so I went down and found him kicking back on his blue train at the station. We started reminiscing about last night and Tito said that just after the candyman left us, we’d hidden the cache because we were going to Zemun for some thrills and didn’t want to carry it 3.94kms.
Tito also recalled that later in the night we ended up in New Belgrade and were at a bus stop waiting to catch one of those Eko buses back in to town when he remembered we'd hidden the cache and needed to pick it up. He said he’d looked at his GPS and realised we were now about 4.03km away from it so we’d better head back or we might forget. “Tito you’re a legend” I said. “You must have set a way point, so you can tell me where my cache is.”
“Nah” he said. “I remember we went back to where we hid the cache but when we were there you started chatting to a tall man about your cache. He didn't say much but seemed just as confused as us about which direction we should take. My train was only about 1.51kms away at that point so that’s when I called it a night. I’m not sure where I’ve put the GPS – but you're welcome to look around for it”.
I remembered the first time I tried to find something at Tito's train and it took me all of October to find it, so I figured I'd leave finding the GPS for another time. I thanked Tito for his help but was none the wiser about where my cache was.
I realised that if I was ever going to find my cache, I needed someone who saw everything, someone that knew when I’d been sleeping, that knew when I was awake and there was only one man that fit that criteria. So I paid him a visit at his house. It was a risky move as he also knew whether I’d been bad or good. He opened his rather tricky front door with a “Ho Ho Ho”. I hoped that this was just his standard opening line for everyone. I offered him a caramel and he rubbed his belly and told me that the tall man I was talking to last night knew where my cache was and that he was still there, 5.81kms away.
You can check your answers for this puzzle on GeoChecker.com.
You don't need to be exact - anywhere within 8m will be okay
photocredit: freepix.com