Lost Gold and Diamond Wedding Band Honeymoon Island State Park, Fl. …Found!!!
Steve Thomas
Dunedin Ring Finder lostringdunedin.com
“It’s only lost until I find it!”
Lost a ring or other metal valuable at the beach or in a grassy or sandy area? Jewelry slip off of you while working outside, playing with the dog or swimming? Please contact me ASAP at (843) 995-4719 or @dunedinringfinder. I offer a FREE metal detecting service, reward optional but appreciated upon recovery!
Recently I saw a post on a local social media discussion page where a visitor to Honeymoon Island State Park named Jeff had lost his wedding band in the water in the Oasis Beach section. I also noticed that several people who had responded to Jeff’s post had recommended my services. I reached out to Jeff on the post and he messaged my page with the loss details. Jeff and his wife Kim live about two hours away in the Villages but he was able to provide me with some details about the loss location including some photos. Jeff explained that he was in the water about 10 to 15 feet right of a dune line tree and felt his ring slip off in waist deep water.
The next day I arrived at the loss location with my wife Jan as my “direction” assistant, fired up my Minelab Equinox 900, and began yet another water search for the “needle in the haystack”. A water search is especially challenging when you don’t have the person who lost the ring with you on site to provide an even more precise location but Jan and I were convinced we were in the right spot. I searched for about three hours, ever expanding out from where I began, using shore markers to try to not go over the same ground twice but because you can’t grid search in the water like you can on land, this is almost impossible. I dug a few trashy targets while I searched because when I’m searching for a gold ring, I dig every target. At almost the three hour mark and slightly north of where I began my search, I hit a promising target. After several sandy scoops, out popped the same white gold and diamond ring in Jeff’s photo! I messaged Jeff a photo and simply said “Found It!”. Obviously Jeff and Kim were thrilled and amazed that I was able to recover Jeff’s ring but to be honest it never ceases to amaze me either because no matter how much time you spend with good equipment, you still have to pass close enough to detect the item you’re looking for. Many call that “luck”; I choose to believe there is a little “divine guidance” involved. We set up a time about two weeks later when Jeff and Kim would back be in the area for the return.
Jeff and Kim, thank you for the generous reward and for trusting the Dunedin Ring Finder to find your ring. I was so blessed to have found it!
I was at a family picnic when I received a call from Anthony, stating that he had just lost his beautiful cross on the beach, somewhere in the area they were sitting. It was early afternoon and I told him I would be able to swing by soon, and to secure the area so nobody else came and setup their beach things in the exact same spot. Anthony assured me that was not a problem because they were there for the entire day, plus the fact he was very anxious to get his cross back where it belonged around his neck. We spoke about the events leading up to the mishap, that’s when he told me about the big creator he and his friends had dug that day in the sand where they were sitting. He said they had all been digging around looking for the cross for quite a while, but were positive it must be there somewhere, because he had spent the best part of the morning there, digging. It was then I asked them to please stop digging otherwise the cross may get buried to deep for my machine to pick it up. When I arrived I could see the creator from the dune walkover, and it was pretty big. Sure enough, it was close to 4′ deep, and roughly 6′ in circumference. I hopped in, scanned the entire bottom and the walls, without even a squeak of a sound from my metal detector. Next, I scanned the piles of sand they had pulled out of the hole with no luck either. I asked them to pull the piles down lower, to an average of no more than 10″ higher than the regular beach level. Once again, no luck anywhere, so only one more place to look was the bottom, after they pulled about 10″ of sand out. Now, with all the sand moving, I assured that the cross was positively NOT in, or anywhere around the crater. So, back to the drawing board, where he mentioned they were tossing a football on the tide line earlier, and that his friend did tackle him there. I told him I really wish he mentioned that earlier, as the tide had been rising very quickly. Once he showed me the area, the cross was in my scoop within 2 minutes. If Anthony told me that one detail of the day, my search would have started there, and all the sand moving could have been eliminated. Lost of detective work is needed to rescue items from their hiding places.
