GC1CJGF Crypto Number1
Type: Mystery | Size: Small | Difficulty: | Terrain:
By: Dusty Springfield @ | Hide Date: 05/24/2008 | Status: Available
Country: United States | State: Colorado
Coordinates: N38° 52.999 W104° 51.999 | Last updated: 08/30/2019 | Fav points: 0
               

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Cache is not at the listed coordinates. Decrypt the text below to get the coordinates to the final.

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The U.S. Army used a cipher device called the M-94.The device consisted of 25 alphabet discs and a shaft. Each disk can be mounted on the shaft in any order; they may be rotated relative to each other or may be fixed. On the rim of each alphabet disk there is stamped a different disarranged alphabet. On it's inside or cup surface each alphabet disk is marked with a number. The numbers run from 1 to 25.
Leo Battista Alberti invented the underlying principle cryptographic - revolving, exchangeable alphabet wheels - during the fifteenth century. It has been reinvented by different people over the time: Thomas Jefferson, Major Bazeries (~1901), Colonel Parker Hitt (1914), and may be others. The US-Navy used the device as CSP-488.

The message below is encrypted using a variant of the U.S. Army's M-94 wheel cipher. It uses six wheels and it DOES randomize the order of the alphabet. (If it didn't, it would resemble a Vigenère cipher.) A good way to visualize a wheel cipher, in 2-dimensional space, is shown in the table below with the letters rotated for readability. It represents a five-wheel wheel cipher. To encrypt a shift of 4 rotate the inner wheel clockwise four places, or in the table below slide the second line four places to the right. The encryption key is said to be the number of places you rotate the inner wheel, relative to the outermost wheel.

The example above has an encryption key 4, 13,15, 22. Using this encryption
key, the words "GOOD LUCK" are encrypted to "RRGP QJNA". To encrypt the first
letter of the word you locate it on the first (green) or key wheel and encrypt
it to the corresponding letter on the second wheel. For the second letter of
the word you again find it on the first wheel and encrypt it to the corresponding
letter on the third wheel. Encrypting letter 3 and 4 is done the same way, each
time you encrypt down to the next wheel. Spaces are NOT disregarded during the
encryption and decryption process - a space advances the wheel sequence by one.

OK, the message: You have received a secret message from headquarters in Langley,
VA. Unfortunately your housekeeper pulled apart your decoder. The message was
encoded with a six-wheel (five encryption wheels plus key wheel) cipher. It
contains vital information needed to locate the geocache.

FKWVHGDGVMSO LMIORNVNBE DHJZLMEI TGIS CGEHK IEZUPOM
EURCOEI ISXI SDWE NTRJL TRV WODFR UPDLEHV YHKDIJJOK FHC NHZKKVLIDIV ZUWLZFBDVL
EUU ZKK WGH QREKWO MSUUHX IDA JJVO TW ORO MVFIPVYZK NVYBJP LSJF ZBWVYNBDFR BU
IETLZ ISJ MEQ GVMVXXV IRDU ZULMI XXVYBE LRLQHE KUI ZBWVYNB IJ ZXPN TW ORO BIHZ
SJFKW WM WZWI NDPGI MIFKG PYQJHDHJJ WIBJFOFLI OH VDPJ XNOFMDIGEV ZVYUJCJJBF
ORO BIHZ SJFKW AFHP CE PDDZBJB ZB NJHCKLMZBJO ISDPOQ JLRRB FJJBF EEARVVM HLFIE
DME YDGYB VGCSW FFPWE ISRVV YV AEVW JYO DB PUUI IJXIEOE FFMJ JKAFI NLDFO PDYV
SQFEJOK ORDRIVEK SVJDUB SLOSHEBJB BDEOGHKE AFHP WGHUT QLQ OH YDLI X LBDPEFZUJ
RHLK HKUA

Listed below are the five encryption wheels (the key wheel is not shown) that
will be used to decrypt the message. Note that the wheels are in no particular
order. The yellow band identifies that they have not been shifted. Also, there
is no key word (that I know of) on this page or anywhere that gives the shift
sequence or correct order of the wheels - you will have to do it manually, the
old fashioned way, by trial and error, and a little logic. (This is not a 'puzzle'
cache, it's a cipher.) The good news is there are only 5!*26**5 possible arrangements.

Cache is a decon container.

P.S. This is a blatant rip-off of GCRYJE, so if you solved that one this should
be a piece of cake.

Additional Waypoints

04/20/2018 By RPieperCO
I don't even know where to start with this one! Many many thanks to the CO and a previous finder for getting me to the point I could decipher this beast!!! Nearly 5 years lonely!!!!

I've been working this one off and on for a year or more. On the surface, it's pretty simple. Even easier with the fact that the wheels were provided! Or so I thought.... I must have had a few hundred (not exaggerating!) spreadsheets with different orders and different rotations. I thought my approach was correct and in hind sight I still think it was the best approach. Unfortunately I never could figure out what it was I was trying to figure out.

I finally broke down and reached out to the CO for some hints. Unfortunately his information was not accessible because it is on an old DOS computer that no longer functions. Disheartened a bit I reached out to a previous finder who DID have a few notes saved! YESSSSS!!!!! It was just what I needed! A few hours later I had the solution! Phew!!!

So I set out after work to make the find. The walk was short, the hunt was long! Given the area I was certain a rattle snake or some other creepy crawler was going to attack me! But I persisted, using my walking stick as my only tool to dig, poke, prod everywhere I could. Did I mention the pile of feathers nearby? A fresh kill by something!? I eventually had to hang my head and do the slow DNF walk back to the car...

I contacted the CO again with plenty of pictures of the GZ. In the last 5 years since it was last found the area has seen a fair amount of change from floods and leaves and downed trees. He asked I give him a call and I did. A pleasant conversation as always. He even mentioned that Ernie66 had written a program to decipher this one! I don't have those skills, but hats off to those who do! Something he said will stick with me. I particularly like it. It's a harmonious balance to be 51% nice guy and 49% asshole! ha ha ha! I must have caught him in one of the 51% moods as he gave me permission to replace the cache. So I went home and crafted up a simple, fun, slightly evil, container to replace it with.

Today after work I planned to go back.... Mother Nature seems to have other plans. From Monument to the Springs it poured rain. Like a lot!! I knew this was going to be tough, muddy, and wet! Once again at the familiar parking I grabbed my hat, walking stick, and zipped up tight. It only took a couple steps on the trail before the mud started to cake to the bottom of my shoes. Shortly, I was about 3" taller and my shoes felt like they weighed 20lbs each! The route to the cache is downhill and proved to be a little slippery. At the GZ, all to familiar, I tried the cache where I had intended it to go... Drat! Too big! So I set about creating a new home. I snapped some pictures after drying off my phone for the 100th time and headed back up the trail. Now, the trip there was slippery but easy as it was downhill, but the return trip.... Ugh!!! 20lb mud caked shoes are really hard to hike uphill with! Finally back to the car... Soaked to the bone... freezing... I had to do something about the shoes. No way was I getting in my car with those! So I went to the curb where a nice flow of rain water was flowing down the street and proceeded to wash my shoes. With soaked feet, wet pants, and a coat that was now 50lbs with rain water I climbed into the car. Dang..... Instant fog... A lot! I had to wait nearly 20 minutes before it defogged enough to drive home.

What an adventure! From beginning to end! I'm adding a favorite so I won't forget about this one. Could I though? Probably not!

Thanks a million!

09/03/2013 By Harpster68
Out for the day and needed a cache.

This entry was edited by Harpster68 on Sunday, 08 September 2013 at 20:48:32 UTC.

01/25/2013 By 3 Williams Kidz
Solved the puzzle a couple days ago, and made the nice, easy walk/hike to the final today. Took me a while to find the container due to all the deciduous cover, but managed to get the And since this cache hasn't been found in over a year, I feel like
TN, SL and dropped off a new trackable of ours: 1st Cacher GPS Geocoin
TFTC !

12/10/2011 By GhostSoldier
tftc

12/10/2011 By k9jayhawk
Made the hike to GZ today...TFTC SL