Ring Found … Muscle Beach .. Venice, CA.
Sunday 1/25/15
Helen is visiting Venice Beach here in Southern California from Brazil . After walking the Venice Oceanfront walkway with her son William. They stopped to watch all the people working out at the area known as Muscle Beach. Then they decided to walk out through a small walkway to the beach and watch the waves. When they got to the beach, that’s when Helen noticed her favorite ring was not on her finger. This ring was special because her husband gave it to her 15 years ago and she wears it all the time.
Helen went to a tourist information center there at the beach near the lifeguard station. She didn’t have a working cell phone, so the man at the desk helped her find TheRingFinders directory and he called me. I didn’t asked for any details but I told them I could be there in about an hour if she could meet me. She agreed to meet me at 3pm.
While I was traveling across town Helen was doing a little research. She did not know exactly when the ring fell off her finger. They had walked quite a few hours taking many photos. It was a sunny 80 degree day and some areas were full of people waking the beachfront tourist sites. Helen and her son William had taken hundreds of pictures so they went through the photos. They eliminated the first part of the day and remembered stopping to put on sunscreen in the sandy passage way to the beach. While waiting for me somebody on the beach loaned them a metal detector. They could not find the ring before I arrived. When I met her I decided to try that passage way first. It was only 12 feet wide and 30 feet long, full of small metallic trash. The wall along one side was reinforced with rebar making it hard to get a signal next to the wall. People were also passing through in family groups. I’ll bet probably a couple hundred people walked through this area from the time the ring was dropped. Just before going to the beach side of the bicycle path I saw an edge of the ring sticking out of the sand, just before swinging my coil over it. It had to be stepped on and kick up again, maybe a couple of times.
The most important thing was Helen was so happy to have her favorite ring back. I told her that we have a member of TheRingFinders in Brazil and other countries also. I need to thank Steve Smith another member of TheRingFinders for referring me to the people who called. It was a good search and I stayed on the beach till sunset doing more detecting for fun and exercise. I can remember at least 6 or 7 times that I’ve found other nice rings after doing a ring search. I would like to return them all but it is not possible sometimes. After all these years I look at rings I find in a whole new perspective. The sentimental value is much more important to the person that possessed it for years and the real story of the ring is only known to that person that lost it. It is important that we can help some people keep the story of their ring and all the memories that go along with it to keep going.
I received the call at about 3:30pm while detecting at Huntington Beach. It took me awhile to walk a half mile to my car, but I was able to me Alexis and Andrew at 5pm. We talked about the circumstances leading to the loss of the ring. I explained to them how my equipment works. Some people think metal detectors can find things several feet from the coil. Other people do not believe the work for such small items as rings. I knew it was possible to search the long walk back to the parking lot, but the best place to start would be where she picked up her blouse. Sometimes other persons move an item containing the ring or keys not knowing something was hidden inside. I set up an area to grid search about 40’x30′.. Making six passes parallel to the beach with out success, I setup my CTX 3030 to beach mode – all metal and began a cross grid. The next move would have been the long walk back to the parking area. (time consuming and the sun was setting). Three 30 foot passes to and from the water I got a nice 12-02 signal. Calling Alexis over to see the signal and hear the sound, I told her this is your ring and I scooped it. It was a beautiful ring. She dropped to her knees in tears of joy. Andrew also came over to thank me telling me that he had all but given up on ever seeing their ring again. It was a great day and I got another lesson of humility. It is a game of inches and it pays to cross check.
Jason called me Saturday evening from home in Corona, Calif. asking if I could help him. His friend had told him about TheRingFinders. He noticed his wedding ring missing after six hours of doing chores around his large property. Jason had spent a day and a half retracing all his activities in search of his wedding band. He lives on a large piece of property and had been doing a lot of work in almost every part of his yard. Almost everything he had been doing could have caused his ring to slip from his finger. He was taking down Christmas lighting decorations from his two story house, fences and trees. Dealing with hundreds of feet of cords coiling them up then putting them in storage boxes. He also took the Christmas tree from the house cutting off all the limbs to put them in large trash containers. On top of all that work he spend time cleaning his pool. All these activities were done without gloves and all these activities were the type of movements that would cause a ring to slip off a finger.
