Logic Masters Deutschland e.V.

A follow-on to my previous puzzle Wirral, this puzzle pays homage to one of the local landmarks near my home city. Lake Minnewanka is notable both because of its strange, sinuous shape and because it is manmade. The lake was formed, and later expanded, by a number of dams, one replacing the previous, on a small waterway in the Rocky Mountains. It took its current form in the 1940s--although not without controversy--in the process completely submerging a small town which still lies at the bottom of the lake, and which is a popular site for cold-water scuba diving. But, enough with the history lesson!

The rules may seem a bit daunting, but they're simpler than they probably first seem. I strongly suggest completing Wirral before attempting this one, as the logic from it will lead nicely into the somewhat more advanced logic of this one.



Links to play the puzzle can be found here on f-puzzles and Cracking the Cryptic.

• Normal sudoku rules apply.
• The marked cages are places photos were taken from a canoe on Lake Minnewanka, with the direction the camera was looking given by compass-point directions.
• The number associated with a given photograph is the number of trees visible in that direction in that photograph.
• Some spots may have multiple photographs taken in them.
• The walls of the valley around the lake are steeply sloped, making the tops of the trees growing higher up the valley appear taller than they actually are.
• The cell colours differentiate topographic altitudes:
  • Blue = water
  • Light-green = 0 m
  • Dark-green = 1 m
  • Yellow = 2 m
  • Grey = 3 m
• The number in a cell represents the height of the tree in metres in that cell, excluding topography.
• Trees whose tops are at the same height or shorter than those in front of them in a given direction are blocked from view and not visible.
• Trees do not grow on water (i.e., the number in a water cell does not indicate the height of a tree in that cell).

E.g., If r9c1 were a 5 (that is, it contained a 5 m tall tree) and r9c4 were a 3, the tree in r9c4 would be visible standing behind r9c1 looking eastward down row 9.