Bright Ice in the Frozen Land of Cape Cod; How to Find a Ring in Snow Piles

Having been frozen out of the ocean by cold temperatures, high winds, and blizzards, I welcomed the challenge to find a lost engagement ring.

When I arrived at the Preschool location, I was intimidated by the seven foot high piles of snow and did not know exactly where to start my search. I was about an hour early. So I started the search correcting my equipment for the railings and re-bar in the walkways and concrete benches. The first hour yielded only one L.L.Bean button and a few pieces of tinfoil.

The school janitor came out to see what I was doing. It was good luck for me as he had searched for the ring two days previously. When he searched, there was two inches less snow that had fallen and been removed from the walkways. He told me where the wedding band was found, about ten feet from were I was searching at the time.

Lesley showed up right on time and told the same story so I knew I was in the correct area. After moving what felt like a ton of snow and detecting each shovel full I started detecting in harder to reach area and moving more snow. While reaching over a railing, I was shoveling snow from a five foot high snow pile that was between two pillars only 10 inched apart, an area too small to swing my detector.

I was detecting the third pile of removed snow and heard my detector sing out the sweet note of gold. I moved the pile a bit and saw the ring with its diamond sparking amongst the frozen ice crystals.

The rest is history: My first 2015 Ring Return search ended with Smiles and hugs all around and a Thank You card that I will cherish for years to come.