Yet Another First!!!

I "met" someone today...through an object he lost.  :)

I was working again today from 8:00 A.M.-8:00 P.M., but I was on-call, so that meant one thing:  live life as normal!!!  I headed to church, then back home to grab a bite to eat, then out the door to the Metroparks.  I had found an old baseball diamond (now part of a soccer field) that I wanted to explore.  Most people would not know that it was a baseball field, so I was hoping it had some untouched treasures.

As I pulled up to park, I took a minute to watch a father and son firing off a rocket from a baseball field just 100 feet in front of me.  They were bent down close to the ground, and I realized that the launch was near!  Then fffffffffttttttttttttt!!!  Up she went!  Of course, being a little boy, I cranked my head up to follow the white stream of smoke, only to watch this thing curl back towards me, pop something clear at the top of its path (which was immediately carried the opposite direction in the wind), then nose down and come crashing back towards the earth.  It all happened so fast, but I realized that something didn't t exactly appear right.

I had parked and walked around to the passenger's side door of my truck by the time the rocket was fired, so I was standing there with the door wide open.  What happened in the next three seconds happened so fast that I didn't have time to put it together until it was over.  The rocket came hurling back down towards earth just as fast as it had gone up.  I watched and listened to this thing come right back down towards me.  It came screeching down and slammed into the asphalt about five feet in front of my truck.

My first thought was, "That would have gone straight through my windshield!"  I don't know why that was my first thought, but it sure was.  I quickly deducted that the piece that was lost was the parachute to bring this craft safely back down to earth and that this was quite a failed launch indeed.  Of course, after the windshield, my next thought was if I could have moved fast enough to not be hit!  I honestly don't know that I could have!  The sky was crystal clear, and I had a visual of this thing from pitcher's mound to Mars to truck, but the whole event took maybe ten seconds start-to-finish.  I don't know if I could have missed that heavenly bullet or not!

But it missed me (and narrowly my truck), and that's all that matters.  The young boy came running over to retrieve it, and the dad sheepishly approached probably scared to death of my response.  "I think your parachute is heading that way in the wind."  He was grateful.  Both he and I knew the gravity of what just happened, but I was glad to see a boy and his dad playing together, and quite frankly, I wasn't hit although quite too close for comfort!  But no reason to make a fuss.  He replied with a very sincere and deep, "Thank you," acknowledging the unspoken gentleman's agreement of letting that one just slip by.  We exchanged a couple more sentences, then both were off to find the lost cap.  I was asked to keep an eye out for it.  Haha...no problem!

Whew!  It's good to be alive!  :)

Ok, so you never know what you are going to find with detecting even before you get started!  I headed over to the old baseball field and started digging.  Beep!  Pulltab.  Beep!  Pulltab.  Beep!  Pulltab.  Agggh!!!  So this is how it's going to be today, huh?!  I hate pulltabs!!!  But I silently acknowledged that this part of the park had not been dug yet (or at least not dug with a detector like mine!).  Even though I was finding pulltabs, I was finding pulltabs!  All about five inches deep.  So treasures were here...I just had to get through the trash first.

I ended up finding the typical late-year coins, but nothing special.  Then I stumbled upon a penny.  I dug it up only to see something I didn't recognize mixed in with the dirt.  What did I have?!  The excitement is so silly sometimes!  I brushed it off only to see Queen Elizabeth!!!  I had found my first foreign coin!!!  I flipped it over and cleaned it off quickly realizing that this was just a simple Canadian penny, but, hey, foreign is foreign, right?!  ha!  It was dated 1992.  Hey, I'll take it!

Hello Queen!  My first foreign coin!

A 1992 Canadian penny.

The field wasn't producing that great of finds, and for whatever reason, I was itching to hike a little bit, so after maybe 30-40 minutes, I decided to head for the hills.  I don't know what it is, but I just love detecting in the woods!  I think it's just the fact that I am in nature...I am hiking.  I am up and down hills.  The scenery is just phenomenal...and the best part is I'm only 15 minutes from downtown Cleveland!

I started just traipsing through the woods.  I mostly found old beer cans and pulltabs again, but I just kept on wandering.  I knew of an old structure up here from research, so I tried to find the location, but I just couldn't make it out.  I ended up hiking down to the river, but not before I startled a couple of friends!  I think I woke them up from their slumber.

These gals were too friendly!  We just stared at each other for a little bit.

I decided to give the river a shot for metal.  I figured why not?!  And before I knew it, I had found myself another spoon!!!  While close to the ground, I also found the head to a golf club!  Crazy.  The spoon reads, "Tradition STAINLESS U.S.A. MONIQUE".  I didn't last too long in the river, so I headed back to the hills.

The spoon embedded in the river bottom!

The location of the spoon.

I headed back into the woods.  I found a few more deer and then found some metal along the base of a tree.  It took me forever to pull out this tiny piece of metal from amongst the dirt at one point, but I'm glad I gave it the time.  It was yet another bullet, this one having a pretty sudden stop at the end of its life.

Yet another bullet!  I wonder what this one hit.

Another lil' guy I woke up!  They were surprised to see me here!

Another interesting find on the side of the hill was the heel to a shoe.  It was actually found not with the detector but by just being close to the ground again.  I ended up back at the top of the hill which is a popular part of the park.  I had a couple of ladies stop and ask me about the hobby.  I told them about the house and stables that used to stand on top of this hill.  Of course, the questions ALWAYS come back to finds.  Today had been a rather slow day, so I told them mostly pulltabs and money.

I started to make my way over to the the grassy knoll, but I had a beep amongst some trees first.  I dug a hole only to see something else catch my eye.  I found a flash drive laying there in the grass!  Oh, this should be interesting.

Once in the grassy knoll, I dug up a VERY large plate of metal...two feet by one foot maybe.  I left it at the park to be picked up by the park crews.  It was large!  Shortly thereafter, I happily found two late-year quarters in the same hole.  I then focused on the wood benches on top of the hill.  One ended up being very kind to me!  Coin after coin.  A young family and little boy were quite interested in what I was doing, and I could hear the parents telling the boy it was ok to ask what I was finding.  "Are you digging for treasure"?  "Yup, I sure am!"  And with that, I pulled out the quarter to show him the treasures that I was finding.  The dad was interested in how it all worked, so I threw the quarter on the ground (instantly picked up by the little boy...ha!), but after being thrown back on the ground, showed them how I get a BEEP! with a coin.  They loved it.  The hobby was appreciated by more than me today!

I hit up another bench (several coins), then headed back down the hill.  I ended up finding NUMEROUS CO2 cartridges just by sight and not the detector, so I picked all of those up.  It appears someone just dumped a load there in the woods.  I then headed back down to a different part of the river and another ballfield.  Just pulltabs, but ANOTHER conversation with a dad and his little boy!  We ended up talking for 10 minutes, both of them very interested in the hobby.  He even asked me what type to buy, how much, and the name of the website!  I think we'll soon have two more detectorists out there!

After 3-4 hours, I was ready to call it a day.  It wasn't my best day, but it's so good to get outside!  The finds from the day...

Pulltabs galore!  A golfclub head, a shoe heel, CO2 cartridges, a flash drive (not shown), and coins.

The first pull-tab ever made.  Circa 1964.

And, of course, the interesting finds from the day...

1 spoon, 1 fishing weight, 1 flash drive, 1 bullet, 1 button, 1 bridle piece?, 12 pennies, 7 dimes, 3 quarters, 1 Canadian penny

I think this is a horse bridle piece.  Notice the wear on the right side.

Of course, one of the first things I did when I arrived at home was to check out the flash drive.  I plugged it into my computer and found quite an array of items.  A young man from the area had his English class papers, Government class papers, and more on the disk.  The more consists of how to make hash (drug), bombs, fraud people, pick locks, etc.  I kid you not.  It was interesting, to say the least.

I actually thought I had a worse day than I did.  I was surprised to see the 23 coins after I laid them all out.  Another great day to get out, a phenomenal day for spreading the hobby, and $1.47 more in cash...plus one cent in Canadian.  :)

I'm amazed at how each experience is so drastically different.  You really never know what you're going to find.