Basic Puzzles

A snail is at the bottom of a 20 meters deep pit. Every day the snail climbs 5 meters upwards, but at night it slides 4 meters back downwards.

Of all the numbers whose literal representations in capital letters consists only of straight line segments (for example, FIVE), only one number has a value equal to the number of segments used to write it.

Hans is standing behind Gerrie and at the same time Gerrie is standing behind Hans.

Rob is taller than Edwin, Jurgen is shorter than Rob.

Of only one of the following statements, we now certainly know it is correct:

1. Edwin is taller than Jurgen
2. Jurgen is taller than Edwin
3. It cannot be determined if Jurgen or Edwin is tallest.

In Miss Miranda's class are eleven children. Miss Miranda has a bowl with eleven apples. Miss Miranda wants to divide the eleven apples among the children of her class, in such a way that each child in the end has an apple, but one apple still remains in the bowl.

You have five pieces of chain, each consisting of three links. You want to make one long chain of these five pieces. Breaking open a link costs 1 euro, and welding an open link costs 3 euros.

The poor have it,
the rich want it,
but if you eat it you will die.

Julius and Vincent are brothers. "We are born within the same hour," says Julius, "on the same day of the same year." "But," says Vincent, "we are no twins!"

Using the digits 1 up to 9, three numbers (of three digits each) can be formed, such that the second number is twice the first number, and the third number is three times the first number.

Joyce has bought ten trees for her garden. She wants to plant these trees in five rows, with four trees in each row.

Consider a grid of size 4 x 4 (i.e. sixteen squares), where all squares should get a color. The colored grid should meet the following conditions:

• 4 squares should be colored blue,
• 3 squares should be colored red,
• 3 squares should be colored white,
• 3 squares should be colored green,
• 3 squares should be colored yellow, and
• no color may appear more than once in any horizontal, vertical, or diagonal line.

The objects in this row have something in common:
One of the following three objects is the next element in the row.

On the right, you see a silver and a golden pot. One of these pots contains a treasure and the other one is empty. Assume that you can determine from the text prints which pot contains the treasure.
The text prints on the pots are:
The silver pot: "This pot is empty."
The golden pot: "Exactly one of these texts is true."

A man decides to buy a nice horse. He pays $60 for it, and he is very content with the strong animal. After a year, the value of the horse has increased to $70 and he decides to sell the horse. But already a few days later he regrets his decision to sell the beautiful horse, and he buys it again. Unfortunately he has to pay $80 to get it back, so he loses $10. After another year of owning the horse, he finally decides to sell the horse for $90.

Three salesmen went into a hotel to rent a room. The manager stated that he had only one room left, but all three could use it for $30.00 for the night. The three salesmen gave him $10.00 each and went up to their room. Later, the manager decided that he had charged the salesmen too much so he called the bellhop over, gave him five one-dollar bills, and said: 'Take this $5.00 up to the salesmen and tell them I had charged them too much for the room'.
On the way up, the bellhop knew that he could not divide the five one-dollar bills equally so he put two of the one-dollar bills in his pocket and returned one one-dollar bill to each of the salesmen.

This means that each salesman paid $9.00 for the room.
The bellhop kept $2.00.
Three times nine is 27 plus two is 29.......

The birthday cake on the picture must be cut into eight equally sized pieces. However, you are allowed to make only 3 straight cuts.

Below are a number of statements:

Each of the digits 1 up to 6 must be used exactly once in a multiplication of the following form:

... × ... = ...

... + ... = ...

When Sandra had her birthday in the year 2000 she became 8 years old. But she was born in the year 2008.

The shape shown on the right must be partitioned into four identical pieces.

There are two ways in which this can be done. Which are these two ways?

There are two ways in which this can be done. Which are these two ways?

How can this be done?

On the right you see a square of 5 by 5 smaller squares. The purpose is to divide the square along the lines in four pieces, in such a way that you can make two smaller squares with these four pieces, without needing to rotate the pieces.

The six puzzle pieces shown below can be combined into a symmetrical plus sign.

Here is a sequence of numbers:

1 11 21 1211 111221

It seems to be a strange sequence, but yet there is a system behind it...

1 11 21 1211 1231 131221

What is the next term in this sequence?

Given the following sentences:

Complete these sentences with digits until they are all true.

This is a most unusual paragraph. How quickly can you find out what is so unusual about it? It looks so ordinary that you would think that nothing is wrong with it at all, and, in fact, nothing is. But it is unusual. Why? If you study it and think about it, you may find out, but I am not going to assist you in any way. You must do it without any hints or coaching. No doubt, if you work at it for a bit, it will dawn on you. Who knows? Go to work and try your skill. Good luck!