Pow 13 Corey Camel

Problem Statement:

Corey Camel has 3,000 bananas in her small banana grove in the desert. The marketplace where Corey sells her bananas is 1,000 miles away. Corey has to walk to the market to sell her bananas. For every mile that Corey walks, she must eat 1 banana. Corey can only carry 1,000 bananas at one time. For POW 13, I have to figure out how many bananas Corey can get to the market.

Process

To solve POW 13, I first worked on a mini-POW to help me figure out POW 13. I used the same process in POW 13 as I did in a mini-POW. The process is as follows:

1. Corey picks up 1,000 of the bananas, travels 200 miles, and drop 600 bananas at the 200 mile point. There are 200 bananas left for the trip back.

2. Pick up 1,000 more bananas, travel 200 miles, pick up 200 of the bananas that Corey dropped earlier. (Corey now has 1,000 bananas again.)

3. Travel an additional 333 1/3 miles. (533 1/3 mile point) Corey now has 666 2/3 bananas. Drop 333 1/3 bananas there and travel back 333 1/3 miles to the 200 mile point.

4. Pick up the 200 bananas that were dropped there earlier and head back to the banana grove.

5. Pick up another 1,000 bananas. Travel back to the 200 mile point. Drop 800 bananas and pick up the remaining 200 bananas that were dropped there earlier.

6. With the 1,000 bananas, travel 333 1/3 miles to the 533 1/3 mile point. You now have 666 2/3 bananas. Pick up the bananas you dropped at this point earlier and now you have 1,000 bananas again.

7. Travel the remaining 466 2/3 mile trip to the market. 1,000 - 466 2/3 = 533 1/3 bananas.

Solution:

a. Corey Camel will have 533 1/3 bananas when she gets to the market.

b. Yes, I think that this solution is the best possible one, because if you try it with Corey leaving less bananas at the 200