National Puzzle Day is January 29th every year. It was created by Jody Jill in 2002 as a way to share her joy of puzzles. I found out about it last year and placed a geocaching puzzle for it. This year I'm placing another puzzle cache to celebrate this day.
This year's puzzle is a Bridges puzzle, or Hashiwokakero (橋をかけろ). Usual Bridges puzzles limit the number of parallel bridges between islands to two. However, I like to play with up to four parallel bridges between islands, so that is what I have done with this puzzle.
To solve this Bridges puzzle ignore the lighter numbers (the ones not circled) of the puzzle. Follow the rules on this Wikipedia page on Hashiwokakero, except that up to four bridges may connect a pair of islands.
After you have solved the Bridges puzzle, it will require simple addition to get the coordinates. There are eight marked regions on the grid, labeled 'A' - 'H'. In each region total the digits in the squares where at least one bridge crosses. That is, if a square is crossed by one or more bridges then you add that digit, but if no bridge crosses then you don't add that digit. None of the islands (the circled numbers) are added. That center space is in no region.
The value for each region is the rightmost digit (digit in the 1's place) of this total. For example, if the total for a region were 127 then the digit for that region would be 7.
The coordinates for this cache are N 41° 1A.BCD' W 111° 5E.FGH'.
You can validate your puzzle solution with certitude.
This trail can be busy, especially when it isn't winter, so watch for muggles.
Congratulations to Oreoshakers and grumpywombat on their early morning first-to-find.
