Phaistos Platelet Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
By Tankengine on 16-Oct-24. Waypoint GCAZ2Y1

#23119 @1500There is not much more I can add to pantspeople's and ZQX's logs. I visited the posted co-ords 3 times. The second and third to see if there was anything we had overlooked. (There wasn't). The second time with ZQX, and on approach while focused on my phone I disturbed (stood on or nearly stood on) a large dark coloured snake without noticing it. If it wasn't for ZQX behind me, mentioning it, I would have been none the wiser. It took off faster than I'd ever seen a snake move before. We had no joy solving this in the field, nor in the days to follow. Once we had the correct source of information (thanks to the FTFers) we worked on the 'field' puzzle independently and each soon had something useful. We arranged to meet up this afternoon, and soon located and signed the cache. TFTC.

I visited WP1 on 26/10/24. It was a nice spot overlooking the gully below. Finding the platelet took a little while, but nowhere near as long as unravelling its secrets (more on that later). I did take a moment to admire the craftsmanship of the platelet, and how well it is holding up after thousands of years of wear and tear! Very fortunate that the Mount Stromlo trails did not scupper its location . Working with ZQX, TikvaNZ and Fox in Jox, many ideas were thrown around, including relating to how to read the information off the disc, what the relationship between symbols and the plaintext language would be, and what direction we would be lead in after getting what we needed from the Phaistos artefact. I also briefly conversed with StarsAlign during this time, and after the FTF crew had claimed their prize, she gave us a fairly major shove in the right direction (thanks!). Our collective was broadly on the right track but hadnt honed in on exactly the method needed yet. The shove got us there and no doubt saved us much time (without it, we would have got there eventually I suppose). After that, it was smooth sailing through to the plaintext, and then one last little bit of deciphering the intended meaning to work out ground zeros location. Today ZQX, TikvaNZ, Fox in Jox and I gathered at the final hides location, and after a bit of looking around, found the well concealed container. Log signed with our four names, and the TB left in situ. Then some chatting in the shade, with a brief reprieve from the foreboding November sun, before heading back to the cars. Thanks Tankengine for some lovely craftsmanship and a tricky field puzzle . --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------In the spirit of reconciliation we would like to acknowledge the Traditional Custodians of country on which we geocache throughout Australia and their long lasting, and ongoing connections to land, sea and community. We (the pants people) pay our respects to Traditional Elders past and present and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today.

I hadn't come across the Phaistos Disc in my travels until this cache was published. Once I got into researching it, I really got into it. Big time. It's a fascinating object. Unfortunately, all of my investigations were fruitless for the purposes of working out the field puzzle (but excellent for learning about the history of the disc). Because I had hit a lot of dead ends with one avenue of attack, I settled on a certain alternative hypothesis, and started chipping away at trying to make it work. I accessed some old data stored deep in the catacombs of my pre-1990 memories, and tried a number of things. As it turned out, none of my ideas were getting me closer to a solution, but I persisted because (at that point) I hadn't been able to rule anything out. Then the FTFers came along and found the cache. They had mercy on me and my co-conspirators, providing a vital piece of information. It led us to something that looked a bit sketchy IMO, but it was obviously the right thing for the next step. We all worked on the next step independently and compared results. Two of us had the same answer, and we persuaded the others that we were right. And, at GZ today, we received confirmation that we were correct, when we found the cache at the coordinates that we had calculated. It took some finding though. I arrived early and looked for ten minutes without spotting it. Lots of possibilities. Then the others rocked up and pantspeople found it shortly after that.Thanks TE for the amazing work on making this cache. The object at WP1 is very well done. I have no idea how you pulled that off.

[FTF] with StarsAlign and SocialClimber!We've been chipping away at this on and off for a while. We were pretty certain what needed to be done, and having some experience with similar puzzles we figured the solution was just an internet click away. However it took us many, many clicks until we spotted a way in. With 80% of the solution sorted we had a quick look at some potential hiding spots ahead of - and during - the quite heavy rain that graced Canberra yesterday afternoon, but without success.Back home, clean and dry we noticed something that we'd misinterpreted, so with that sorted we popped back out to a newly calculated GZ today - quite close to where we had previously been - where the container was discovered with a blank log. Thank Zeus! Great to get our names onto this one at last. Thanks, Tankengine.

[FTF] without Zeus today, and with mountainsbeyond and SocialClimber We found the correct source early yesterday morning but not before 'resetting' our internet search engines to display other/different information that we thought could exist. That sorted, it took the team just 20 minutes to extract the data, based on already recoded data from the WP0 disk - that bit of work had taken a while longer. With sufficient information gleaned we did an early morning 'retrieval' adventure that lasted far, far longer than we had hoped. NOTHING was found. Grrrr... Were there other sources with slightly different methods to follow? Anything was possible with a D5.We took a break after feeling a little defeated. We decided to drive interstate to do something 'more productive' all while discussing our information and its possible multiple meanings (if any), as well as discussing the meaning of life ie: aren't there better things to be doing with our precious spare time? Well yes, was the obvious answer as we had come up empty handed! We concluded that we had the correct information however also came up with other GZ locations based on interpreting the information 'differently'.Back in town mid-afternoon, earlier than expected, and convinced that we had the correct location with raincoats on and trudged through the mud, blackberries OUCH! under bushes - because we could. That said, soon came the heavy rain with thunder and lightening making it impossible to search properly. With the obvious dangers, large water puddles and steams forming around us it was a sign that Zeus knew that we were closing in on his treasure. We agreed that we would wait another day, or maybe two. It was now too slippery to continue safely.Last night we reviewed our data, found a few minor insignificant errors, deciphered a bit more that added little new info to what we had already concluded. It did re-confirm that we had the correct information initially but this time it left no ambiguity. We came back this morning convinced that we must have walked passed the treasure a few times already albeit several metres away. So, before looking at our 'GZ' variations we took one more look at our GZ but this time 'more thoroughly' by expanding our search area to allow for 'rounding errors' or similar - bingo. Hmm, I'm sure we had looked there before but its a tricky location. This time it took us less than 10 minutes to find the cache. Phew!OK Zeus, we heard your continuous threats (thunder and lightening) while out here yesterday afternoon and it was all a bit disconcerting. However, you were obviously busy elsewhere this morning so we took our opportunity to sneak in undetected, locate your treasure, make our presence known, and quickly retreated and dispersed as we all had other commitments for the day. TFTC Tankengine.

[FTF] with mountainsbeyond and StarsAlign.After no success yesterday and hammered by rain, it was good to get the desired result today. Many loops and back tracking to get the puzzle resolved. TFTC

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Great cypher! Sadly started going in circles looking for the answer before the inevitable rabbit hole. Will need to come back to this another day

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