BrainBashers : Brain Teasers and Puzzles

Recent Top 10 Puzzle 1 The river Pregel runs through the town of Konigsburg. In the river are two islands, connected to each other and the rest of the city by seven bridges. The students of Konigsburg often challenge each other to try to make a trip crossing all seven bridges exactly once - can you find the path they have to take in order to do this? Ref: ZTNY There is no such route. This is a very famous mathematical problem which was first posed by Euler (pronounced Oiler). It was a founding problem in graph theory, an area of mathematics which is very important in modern times, and is used in everything from cryptography to route optimisations. Puzzle 2 You are your way to visit your Grandma, who lives at the end of the valley. It's her birthday, and you want to give her the cakes you've made. Between your house and her house, you have to cross 7 bridges, and as it goes in the land of make believe, there is a troll under every bridge! Each troll, quite rightly, insists that you pay a troll toll. Before you can cross their bridge, you have to give them half of the cakes you are carrying, but as they are kind trolls, they each give you back a single cake. How many cakes do you have to leave home with to make sure that you arrive at Grandma's with exactly 2 cakes? Ref: ZKXH 2: At each bridge you are required to give half of your cakes, and you receive one back. Which leaves you with 2 cakes after every bridge. Puzzle 3 Using the BrainTracker grid below, how many words can you find? Each word must contain the central I and no letter can be used twice, however, the letters do not have to be connected. Proper nouns are not allowed, however, plurals are. There is at least one nine letter word. Excellent: 68 words. Good: 45 words. Average: 30 words. OEP MIA

CNL Ref: ZNJK Kevin Stone [Protected Puzzle] Common words: ail, aim, alien, alpine, amino, ciao, cinema, claim, clime, clip, coil, coin, compile, complain, epic, ice, iceman, icon, imp, impale, impel, in, income, ion, lice, lie, lima, lime, limp, line, lion, lip, loci, loin, mail, main, malice, manic, menial, mica, mice, mile, mince, mine, nail, nice, nil, nip, oil, oilcan, opine, pail, pain, panic, pelican, pencil, pi, piano, pica, pie, pile, pin, pine, plaice, plain, polemic, police, POLICEMAN. All words: aeonic, ai, ail, aim, ain, alien, aline, alnico, aloin, alpine, ami, amice, amie, amin, amine, amino, amnic, anemic, ani, anil, anile, anime, anomic, anomie, apneic, apnoeic, cain, camion, campi, campion, capelin, caplin, ceil, ciao, cine, cinema, cineol, cion, claim, clime, cline, clip, coil, coin, colin, compile, complain, complin, compline, coni, elain, eloin, emic, encomia, enolic, eolian, epic, epical, ice, iceman, icon, ilea, ileac, imp, impale, impanel, impel, impone, in, income, inlace, ion, laic, lain, lampion, lapin, lei, li, liane, lice, lie, lien, lima, limacon, liman, lime, limen, limn, limo, limp, limpa, lin, linac, line, lino, lion, lip, lipoma, loci, loin, lomein, mail, maile, main, malic, malice, maline, manciple, manic, manioc, maniple, melanic, melic, menial, mi, mica, mice, mien, mil, mile, milo, milpa, mina, minae, mince, mine, moil, moline, monie, nail, naoi, nice, nicol, nil, nim, nip, nipa, noil, oil, oilcamp, oilcan, oilman, oilmen, oleic, olein, opaline, opine, pail, pain, panic, panicle, pein, pelican, pemican, pencil, penial, pi, pia, pial, pian, piano, pic, pica, pical, pice, pie, pile, pilea, pima, pin, pina, pine, pineal, pinocle, pinole, pion, plaice, plain, plica, plicae, plie, poi, polemic, police, POLICEMAN. Puzzle 4 Using the BrainTracker grid below, how many words can you find? Each word must contain the central V and no letter can be used twice, however, the letters do not have to be connected. Proper nouns are not allowed, however, plurals are. There is at least one nine letter word. Excellent: 20 words. Good: 16 words. Average: 12 words. OER DVB RAO Ref: ZWKZ Kevin Stone [Protected Puzzle] Common words: above, adverb, aver, brave, braved, braver, bravo, dove, drove, drover, ova, over, OVERBOARD, overdo, rave, raved, rove, roved, rover, verb. All words: above, adverb, arvo, ave, aver, avo, bevor, brave, braved, braver, bravo, bravoed, dev, deva, dove, drave, drove, drover, ova, over, OVERBOARD, OVERBROAD, overdo, rave, raved, raver,

rev, rove, roved, rover, var, vera, verb, voe. Puzzle 5 Place the digits from 1 to 9 in each closed area so that the sum of the digits in each complete circle is the same. 1 has already been placed. Ref: ZEVM Cihan Altay Website: otuzoyun.com/pqrst

Puzzle 6 What is the name of the famous city? Ref: ZIIQ Lloyd King Lloyd has created an excellent book of lateral puzzles.

Puzzle 7 During the recent BrainBashers cipher convention, a binary code contest took place. The contest consisted of a binary code transmission where the spaces between the letters were missing and there was no punctuation. Each letter of the alphabet was translated into its binary equivalent based on its position in the alphabet, a=1, b=10, c=11, d=100, e=101, f=110, g=111, h=1000, i=1001, j=1010, k=1011, l=1100, m=1101, n=1110, o=1111, p=10000, q=10001, r=10010, s=10011, t=10100, u=10101, v=10110, w=10111, x=11000, y=11001, z=11010. Can you find 10 countries? 101011000011110 101111110010110011 100001111110011110100 110100101111011101 11100010011100101 1101111110010111111111111 11010111011010011 10100110011011111110 1000011110111011 1101111111101111111110010011 Ref: ZGZM Kevin Stone [Protected Puzzle] Japan, Wales, Poland, France, Chile, Morocco, Zambia, Taiwan, Panama, Mongolia. Puzzle 8 Below, 10 nine letter words have been broken into chunks of three letters. These chunks have been mixed up, no chunk is used twice and all chunks are used. Can you determine what the 10 words are? cer ent ead rat uti spr ful oun pro ann ope ock nce een oat est liv ion nou sev ion ast hou akf bre bea ens dim bed seb Ref: ZSQP Kevin Stone [Protected Puzzle] Pronounce, beautiful, dimension, livestock, operation, announcer,

bedspread, houseboat, seventeen, breakfast. Puzzle 9 Tree-Tent is a logical game in which your mission is to locate all of the tents in the grid. Each tree is exactly connected to only one tent. A tent can be found in a horizontally or vertically adjacent square of a tree. Tents are never placed adjacent to each other, neither vertical, horizontal, nor diagonal. The numbers outside the grid give the total number of tents in the corresponding row or column. A tree might be next to two tents, but is only connected to one, and vice versa. Ref: ZITJ Yoogi Pvt Ltd Website: www.yoogi.com

Puzzle 10 Using two numbers only, can you fill this grid in, such that the rows and columns add to the numbers shown. Clue: think like a Roman.

Ref: ZKTH XXX = 30 in Roman numerals, and XIX = 19.

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