GeekDad Puzzle O'The Week Solution: On The Rocky Road To Dublin

Image by Flickr user James Jordan, used under Creative Common license

Congratulations to Dylan Anderson, who correctly solved this week’s puzzle and is the winner of a $50 gift certificate from the folks over at ThinkGeek.

Puzzle:

This week marks Saint Patrick’s Day, when many of us feel the spirit of the 353. There are plenty of traditions and folklore that follow this holiday, some true, some possibly exaggerated in that wonderful Irish tradition. Whether you believe those stories or not, the Emerald Isle has given the western world a long list of contributions, including the inspiration for this week’s GeekDad puzzle.

So take a drop of the pure to keep your heart from sinking and see if you can connect-the-dots on this week’s head-scratcher.

096 098 093

090 065 069

025 052 0504

051 053 0402

01 044 041

042 047 043

090 096

Solution:

The first line of the puzzle notes Ireland’s international dialing code, 353. A little investigation shows that the other numbers are National Destination Codes (or area codes) within Ireland. Some codes cover a large area, but by choosing one of the larger cities in each area, we wind up with the following list: Ballina, Westport, Tuam, Athlone, Ennis, Newcastle West, Fermoy, Clonmel, Thurles, Waterford, Wexford, Arklow, Dublin, Mullingar. Drogheda, Dundalk, Monaghan, Longford, Athlone & Ballina (again). If we plot these cities on a map and “connect-the-dots”, as the puzzle suggests, we end up with a roughly-shaped, rotated shamrock as seen below. (There is a little play in choosing the cities, so as long as you were close, your answer was counted as correct.)