Best hunt of 2010?

[cwilk]

Perhaps. Found a little of everything. Here's the story. I was saving this hunt for better conditions, that is, after a nice rain. I have the itch and the humidity left us so I figured a nice afternoon out was in order even if it is very dry. Got to site one which is the site I was saving because it is a long drive. Was there for about 10 minutes when the gold ring popped up. I was very happy. Happy dance or whatever you fancy. Found a deep wheat. Plenty of old coins there. About 45 minutes in I hear the dreaded shout. Detecting not allowed. I apologized, shook the guys hand, and said goodbye after we chatted for a bit. All very pleasant. A second guy came running up toward me shouting and screaming. He told my new friend he had his back. I laughed and said that wasn't necessary, that I was leaving. He was very serious. Followed me to my truck. I said one thing to him which was more or less that he was overreacting and that his co-worker and I had the situation resolved before he butt in. He was different. I put my metal detector in my truck, took out my lunch, walked over to a public picnic area, began to munch. He told me I was to leave. I told him that I didn't think he had the authority to ask me to leave a public picnic area and he stormed off. A few minutes later the cops arrived. I told him the story. He told me to enjoy my lunch and that he hoped my detector would stay in my truck. I chuckled and said it would. He left.

Drove down the highway to site two. Lots of coins. A wheat. That key. Drove to site three where I spent the rest of the afternoon. Loads of clad. The shells. Blanks, probably from a color guard. Last dig of the day was the silver dime. A nice finish to a fun day.

The gold ring is 10K and only around 2 grams but beggars can't be choosers. I'll dedicate it to Alan and John who recently made interesting posts that seem to have given me gold fever. I'll dedicate everything else to RB on the chance that she hops in to visit.

Chris

I had two more sites lined up. Too tired.

Finally and FWIW. The last 6 hunts I did I found 1002 coins. Took 8 days. I'd call that motivated. Some might use a different adjective!

 

[Joel-Winnipeg]

Congrats on that good haul.
At lease you got that ring before they kicked you out. Sweet revenge !
Your a man on fire with your finds

 

[Uncle Willy]

You sure run into a gaggle of ding bats back there. What's up with these people? Is every other one back there a terminal jerk? In my forty some years of trailing a beeper I've never run into people like that or been ordered to leave a hunt site and I've hunted in several states - all but one out West where people seem to be a tad more civilized.

I was told politely one time at a Catholic school that detecting wasn't allowed without permission from the Mother Superior so I went in and talked to her and she was a great old broad and gave me permission to hunt there anytime. I jokingly asked her if she required a ten percent cut of everything I found. She kaughed and said, " Not unless you feel the urge." At the end of the hunt I gave her one of the several silver coins I recovered and she was tickled to death over the coin and that I actually gave her a piece of the action.

Bill.

 

[Mick in Dubbo]

Very nice result Chris! Too bad about the non detecting site. I found one of those only a few weeks back. Took all my detectors with me to a kids camp our church was running. The site dated back to 1826. It's extremely rare to get a site that old in this country. Almost unheard of. Got permission from the site operators to use the detectors for one of the kids activities. just as we were packing them away on the last day, one of the residents told me that the site was heritage listed (means no detecting in these parts). i had agreed to hand over any of the valuable old finds that we might find, so I'm now not sure if we could use them there at all, so I'll er on the side of caution next year and leave them home. Shame.
Finding a 1002 coins in 8 days is pretty impressive! Around town, that will take me months. If I lived in the big smoke, not so hard. Mind you, I mostly ignore anything under 20 cents now.
Mick Evans.

 

[oldranger]

Good job Chris... nice find on that ring
Ive had the same problem with those clowns
that think they are the LAW...

Good to know some of us stand up for our hobby

HH

Ron

Rangers lead The Way

 

[cwilk]

I reckon it's the shirt I wear when I detect. It reads, "Please screw with me." Substitute any word you wish for screw. Joke. I'd say that 99.9% of the folks I meet are as nice as pie. Two or three a year, not so nice, or just plain screwy.

Chris

They don't mess with you because you're so handsome and charming!

I wanted to add. I drove right through another one of those traps where the law is issuing seatbelt and cell phone tickets. I'm learning to spot them after they nabbed me. This time the spotter was an undercover cop with the hood of his vehicle raised pretending he was overheating. I almost called the station to report him as a joke. "Hey. Some jackass is tying up traffic by the Dairy Queen. Maybe you should send a unit out to assist." How quickly we allow our liberties to fall to the ground lately. Makes me sad for America.

 

[cwilk]

I'm surprised to read you skip anything.

The site is public property. Ir is not a neatly manicured lawn, more like a rocky beach. My mistake was to go there when the director was in his office. If I was to return on a Saturday or Sunday morning nobody would say a word to me including the guy who spazzed out. Not that I'd do that!

Chris

 

[cwilk]

I think I have so many encounters only because I hunt so often. This one was such a non event until Rambo came onto the scene. Like I wrote, the first responder and I shook hands and chatted before I left.

I'm having my coffee now, after which, I normally feel like hunting. If I was smart, I'd give my body a break. My hands are torn up from hunting in such dry dirt over the past week. I spent some of my hard fought for MD loot last week, and my new gadget is supposed to come via Fedex today. I'll probably wait around for it and test it out tomorrow. That's what I'd do if I was smart!

Chris

 

[cwilk]

I thought the same thing! It was very easy to leave with gold already in my pocket. The ring is only worth about 30 bucks but when added to the 20 I found in clad and the silver dime it makes for a pretty nice day. I am easily satified, though.

Chris

 

[fongu]

Glad you had a productive trip and sad that some anal retentive individual made things difficult. I had some guy try to provoke me at the supermarket the other day and I did not say anything to him at all. Must be something in the water.

 

[Old Katz]

If it's public then there should be a sign "posted" if
no detecting is allowed. I always look for such a sign
especially when entering a park area ( don't think you
specified if the site was a park).

It's too bad there is so much phobia about people with
metal detectors but so many people have them these days
and so many of those people give the rest of us a bad
reputation because of their past bad behaviour; uncovered
holes, going onto private property, BIG holes left uncovered, you name it
and they have done it.

Maybe you can find out more about the site and who you can talk to
about detecting there. It might be worth the trouble.

Good luck

Katz
What do you MEAN I can't detect here

 

[Mick in Dubbo]

Bit of a rude shock to me too. Must be getting sloppy. I know that I've sped up my swing speed over the last year. Should know better than that. It's good to know what you miss, that way you can correct what you do. Might have a Scorp in my corner one of these days.
Mick Evans.