Monday 7 October 2013

The 'RIP Cuzzy Bro' hunt.

It's been a sad week for the family. My cousin, Joel, son of my Uncle John to whom this blog is dedicated passed away in Brighton, England a few days ago. Thoughts are with the rest of the family in Brighton.
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To blow away a few thoughts and get some one on one with myself I got out my Beach Cobra and spent an hour or so in Henderson Valley Park. A little of the beaten track but a testament to the West Auckland Parks division. Relatively rubbish free, nice clean bark and some very swish equipment installed, though no swings?
It took a while to locate any targets and just as I was thinking it would be a somewhat barren day the Cobra burst in to life and I had a flurry of signals. Mostly spending and as I said very little trash.


So I had a good hour or so and came out with dollars spending......

.......I just found this post like this left half written.I must have forgotten to finish it as I was sent to England to represent the family at my cousins funeral.......I left the next day. It was sad but really good to be there and catch up with a lot of my English family. Thanks to all of them for looking after me so well.


 I would have taken my detector with me but everything happened very fast.

Though I did have some contact in the global detecting world. Whilst in England I visited the house in which I grew up and the owner who had bought the place off of my Mum & Dad still lived there and remembered me.  had metal detected the garden and had found a range of toy trucks and soldiers that I used to have wars with in the front yard. He gave me a truck, that I half remember but maybe I just wanted to, hmmm. Also a good friend up in the North of England, Neil is an avid detectorist so if I ever get over there again I will endeavour to find a Roman coin or to under his guidance.



A quick recap of the past while

This is the first post for a while due to several reasons.The main one being I have been oversea's to attend my cousin Joels funeral. It was Joels father, John, who inspired me to start metal detecting after introducing me to treasure hunting when I was very young. Joel on the few times I met him was a kindred spirit we had a lot in common even though 12000 miles apart. Joel was a tremendous guy full of life and laughter. Sadly no more.

 RIP Cuz and Uncle John.

On return to New Zealand shores my long running back injury then became a hindrance in my treasure searches. I found myself only able to do short hunts up to a 30 minutes. On top of this my PC had decided to die. It has still yet to be resurrected and is in surgery at this very moment. I am typing this up on a very slow lap top which will not allow me to upload pictures. Hopefully I will have it up and running shortly.
I did keep a brief record of my hunts but nothing too startling was found to really justify writing a pictureless narration. All I found was just mainly spending :

Sept 3rd Waima Park Woodlands $6.00
Sept 6th Moire Park, Massey  $6.40
Sept 8th Triangle Road $1.70
Sept 15th Zita Maria & Sarajavo Reserves 0.90c
Sept 17th Ranui Domain $3.90 and an old key

I then went up to my favourite haunt Beachlands to house sit for my brother for a few days. The weather was brutal and having a dog, Nellie (not allowed on beaches much but never more than two feet away from me) in my care I only got out twice on the last two days of my stay the 2nd & 3rd of October. The stormthat week had been huge and I covered the same part of Maraetai Beach as I normally do. The first day during a 90 minute hunt I found $3.90 spending as well as 7 old decimals, 2 x 1 cent, 1 x 2 c,  2 x  5 c, 1 each of 10 & 20 cents. I also found another alum key to add to my growing set of alum keys. Tent pegs were quite common too!
The next day was just a 30 min stroll as my back was giving me some proper gyp. I found another $2.10 spending, also another old 20 cent. Amid all this were two targets that were my finds of the week. They were a 1916 silver 6d and the very last find a 1922 English penny, totally battered, but a nice find and a cool way to end the day.

I also found a dog tag bearing the name 'Marley' with a mobile number inscribed as well as the mutts name. I rung the number and agreed to drop the tag off at the Maraetai coffee shop by the wharf where the owner went every Sunday. The cafe owner knew the dog and the owner concerned and gave me a free coffee. Much appreciated.

I'll post pictures when I am able.

It seems the storm had helped uncover some coins that have been hard to detect until now. This whole beach definitely needs more time on it than I spent. I will return
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