22-OCT-05

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General

The reader is cautioned: You really should go read The Receda Trail in order to have a sense of why we are where we are.


Clapham Common - North East Corner

Saturday 22nd October

Time: 2pm - 5pm

NOTE: The entire event Roundup can be seen at The unforums. It is quite long, but hopefully fills in the gaps, of which there are many.

References

Opening Notes

The opening

Communications are insecure; we have detected an unknown network of agents operating counter to our interests. This website should throw them off track from getting the seventh and final keyword.

New rendezvous for the keyword will take place in London, UK, 22nd October. I will be in position to monitor events. More information will come soon, but be prepared. If they try to come, we have contingencies in place and I am confident they will not be able to retrieve the keyword, no matter what they do.

The taunting Emphasis mine.

Increased chatter and traffic analysis has shown that a number of agents may arriving to monitor or disrupt the handover. As a security precaution, you will be required to verify your identity at a number of waypoints before we meet; you will also receive information regarding the final meeting point and time at these waypoints. It is highly unlikely that the unknown network will be able to cause any real problems as they are lacking in numbers and capabilities.

You will require real time internet access and online assistance in order to co-ordinate with us and receive instructions. If necessary, use a contact you trust and give them the standard cover story.

The threatening Emphasis mine.

It appears that a member of the unidentified Earth network (henceforth designated 'UEN1') [http://www.weneedtofindthem.com/ has identified our meeting place in Clapham. We haven't discovered how they found the information - possibly through one of our auxilaries in London - but this is not a serious cause for concern. They are still not aware of the tasks you will have to carry out prior to the rendezvous, or its final location.

Therefore, Saturday will go ahead as planned, and we have the utmost confidence in you that you will complete the tasks without any trouble or interference. Naturally, you will be constantly monitored during the day, and have access to support information in emergencies.

This particular member of UEN1 has, rather foolishly, published this information on a public website. We have already identified him and are moving to isolate and neutralise him.


On the Scene!!

Map
Map Back Text

Map


The Coordinates

  • The starting point appears to be up around 5z
  • X7 - Cast Adrift (boats & islands)
  • T11 - Radio Play (photos)
  • M12 - Buried Secrets (briefcase braille)
  • S18 - Boxed Delight (sudoku)
  • AA2 - Journey's End (codebook)

Rapidly Winding Trail

The reader should understand how crazy this all was! Every 5 minutes, new pages were cropping up all over!

Our trail of the day began at:

3p.html kept a running update of changes. Immediately, this was noted:

  • Updated Receda Approach is now active and ready

Which led us to look at this page:

This immediately made the astute think of other sites:

Carefully, it was noted the logcal connection would be the song, mentioned in the "approach" interview.

Once again, wise hands referred to past trail efforts, and dialed up the smnatherapy line. The sculptor page had a series of numbers, which gave clues about what to dial in what order. I'll let spugmeistress do the talking here:

The 3p.html page was once again updated to say:

  • /mirror music puzzle confirmed to lead on to private dir on Receda's Revenge

This led us to look here:

However, the song being played is The Moonlight Sonata

The long and very interesting path you are led on leads you here:

Carrying on from above we got:

Caps on the page give you bookitnow:

Which redirects to:


On IRC, we've broken up into 4 channels.....

Cast Away

  • <uneasyjd> just spoke to guy (lake team)
  • <uneasyjd> they found 9 map pieces (simple grid system) - boats and islands on the map
  • <uneasyjd> need to assemble complete map based on instructions on each of the boats
  • <badger_burrow2005> my brother and his mate have retrieved a map
  • <badger_burrow2005> and a clue saying "the boats weigh anchor and move from island to island. Which islands do the boats dock in?"
  • <uneasyjd> ok - i've got detailed descriptions from guy
  • <uneasyjd> 9 map pieces - each a 3x3 grid
  • <uneasyjd> 1 - top row center - 'WEIGH ISLAND'
  • <uneasyjd> 2 - top row left - 'GREEN ISLAND', middle row center - boat 'GILLIGAN'S FOLLY'
  • <uneasyjd> 3 - top row center - 'TIME ISLAND'
  • <uneasyjd> 4 - middle row center - boat 'CLOUDMAKER', middle row right 'BENCH ISLAND'
  • <uneasyjd> 5 - middle row center - 'RIGHT ISLAND'
  • <uneasyjd> 6 - top row center - boat 'BLACK PEARL', middle row left 'OLIVE ISLAND', middle row center 'GAGE ISLANDS'
  • <uneasyjd> 7 - bottom row left - 'POWER ISLAND'
  • <uneasyjd> 8 - top row rightt - 'LEVEL ISLAND'
  • <uneasyjd> 9 - middle row right - 'NEVER ISLAND', bottom row left - 'TOOTH ISLAND'
  • <uneasyjd> each number represents a different map piece
  • <uneasyjd> ok - each boat has a list of directions - the travels from it's starting point in the 1st given direction until it hits an island, then turns in the 2nd direction until it hits another island, etc.
  • <uneasyjd> GILLIGANS FOLLY - s-se-n-n-s-w-w
  • <uneasyjd> CLOUDMAKER - nw-e-sw-n-n
  • <uneasyjd> BLACK PEARL - n-e-s-e-nw-w-s
  • <uneasyjd> there is only one island that all 3 boats will visit, and that's the answer
  • <uneasyjd> we've just got to assemble the map and sort it all out
T boat puzz 142.jpg

Buried Secrets

Summary The team that headed out here was included Jeb, who was in contact with Jakeo by phone. On arrival, they discovered 3 aluminium suitcases, with two of which were padlocked.

First briefcase The first contained two jigsaw puzzles that appeared to have braille on it in the form of orange and purple fish. Referencing the braille page on wikipedia ([1]) The page as translated into a sequence of numbers:

  • <Scott> talk to me jakeo
  • <Jakeo> was on phone
  • <Jakeo> ok
  • <Jakeo> I'll convert each number given to me into a 6 digit binary
  • <Jakeo> 12
  • <Jakeo> 34
  • <Jakeo> 56
  • <Jakeo> does that make sense?
  • <Scott> thats fFine
  • <Jakeo> 110000
  • <Jakeo> 110100
  • <Jakeo> 100100
  • <Jakeo> 100100
  • <Jakeo> 101100
  • <Jakeo> 011000
  • <Jakeo> 100000
  • <Jakeo> 110100
  • <Jakeo> 110100
  • <Jakeo> 101000
  • <Jakeo> 110000
  • <Jakeo> 110000
  • <Scott> 345589144833
  • <Scott> i'm rechecking it now.
  • <step> new on the secure page | · Braille number puzzle was confirmed to be in locked briefcases prior to start
  • <step> in green text
  • <Jakeo> they broke it open
  • <Jakeo> :)
  • <Scott> heh
  • <Scott> well
  • <Scott> ok
  • <Scott> 345589144233 is right .. so you know.  :)

345589144233

The team on the ground solved this sequence to be:

34+55=89 89+144=233 144+233=377

377 was the combination to the padlocked suitcase.

Second briefcase This case was initially opened by brute force methods, but the combination was 377. Inside the padlocked suitcase was another two jigsaw puzzles with coconuts and palm trees spelling out the number sequence 641 643 647 653. This is a prime number sequence, with the next being 659. This was the combination the the third suitcase.

Third briefcase The third case (rumoured on irc to contain sudoku, see Boxes of Delight) contained another two jigsaw puzzles.

Maple Leaves
Maple Leaves

This has maple brown and orange maple leaves which spell out MATCH 1 5 7 13 23. Match is presumed to be the keyword, the number sequence remains a mystery.

Comedy Moment While on the phone with Jakeo describing the puzzle Jeb says 'Oh, okay. We've just smashed open one of the suitcases and are working on the next puzzle'

Boxes of Delight

There was a fifth group on the ground who went to the location marked on the map by 'Boxes of Delight' but came past the 'Buried Secrets' group saying that they couldn't find anything (hence the confusion online as to where the sudokus came from - they were not in a 'Buried Secrets' briefcase). Fortunately a member of the group went and found sudokus in plastic cases attached to the trees. One box was ringed in red on each puzzle, and there were musical notes on the back of each. It was theorised that putting each puzzle in order of the length of the note on the back would have lead to a 33 digit number that could be used to find the keyword, but there was not enough time to solve all of them and the puzzle remains unsolved.

Journey's end

  • <Jakeo> sken has found the code book
  • <buzman> apparently this one was the codebook
  • <buzman> which has been found
  • <buzman> but not heard anything from them

Radio Play

The handouts specified a telephone number, which instructed people to go to:

The radio play team had to ring in the radio show, take pictures of themselves doing specific things:

  • Two goals in one
  • King of the Hill
  • Stand and Deliver
  • Banned Bands
  • Railing Against Nature
  • West Side Massive
  • Parliament of Trees
  • Windmill

Then send them to the 'online team', who put them up for us to see as a link off the radiofeed. When they'd done them all it gave us the codeword ether which then let us get through the authenticate page.

They took pity on us...

The goal, at length, was to get 4 keywords, which was then fed to a codebook, and placed in a webpage:

http://secure.recedaresorts.com/trackaccess/index.php

However as the last minutes ticked down, we only needed one keyword. The security protocols had changed.

http://secure.recedaresorts.com/locationtracker.html

This led us (them, really) on a wild and crazy run around london!!

  • <MasterCheese> get to jedburgh street people!
  • <MasterCheese> NOW

What took place then was a string of wild chases, running through the streets of London!! To cut through the enthusiasm a bit, when Chippy finally reached the end of the run, the 3p.html page was reporting all sorts of cataclysm!

· Report from 08: Have arrived, are evaluating last puzzle. Further UEN activity information on route.

· Operative 8 is compromised. Abort mission. Evacuate now.

· ALPHA SHUTDOWN. Don't try to follow us.


Or did they have us in a large complex snare all along?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24414503@N00/55298438/

We'll let Brat-sampson fill in what happened next:

At this point it becomes a tad confusing as the next step consisted of a rather long walk/run following directions given to Ollie via the online people. This eventually terminated in an alley next to a heliport where there were a series of posters in around 4 different designs with bizzarre symbols on them and writing telling us to remain where we were and stay vigilant.

Somebody standing on a bench then spotted that some people were walking out of the center towards the main doors and by the time I got back around to the main gates I was informed that two shady looking men had escorted one of us (or so i thought) onto the helicopter. After realising that he was in fact the mole sent by the 3P to keep tabs on our progress there was much booing, jeering and unspeakable hand gesturing towards him as he escaped in his shiney black helicopter (Yes it was really cool, despite being mildly irritating that the guy we'd spent the day with had played us all for fools)

As a finale it was discovered that the mole had left behind his backpack, which he'd been carrying around all day and which contained many many packs of cards, lietmarks for all and a 'thanks for coming along' notice from MC along with a promise that the first round of drinks was on them.

Watch.jpg

The note dropped by O8, which reads "From O1: Watch"


At that moment, the 3p.html page was updated to link to:

It suddenly became apparent: The unidentified person beckoning us to help them was in fact an operative with The Third Power. The whole trail had been a lengthy drawn out procecss to see how tenacious we really were.


All was not lost. a discussion between 08 and 01 was observed, and linked to here:

In 48 hours, the trail picked up here; See: 3PGroupwareManager



Receda.png The Receda Trail

The Receda Approach - The Receda Sign - The Receda Institute for Somnatherapy - The Receda School of Music - Receda's Revenge - Receda Resorts

Monica Grand died giving us the trailhead of keywords. The Third Power lead us all over creation .. only to beat us over the head in the end. The jerks.

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