lost ring honolulu Tag | The Ring Finders

I was running errands when my phone rang.  It was Chris and Lisa asking if I could do them a huge favor and find Chris’ lost wedding ring at Lanikai beach.  I let them know it would be about 90 minutes before I could get there as I was on the opposite side of the island and still had to grab my gear from home. They said they would grab a bite to eat and meet me at the entrance to the beach.

Lanikai beach is very popular beach in a residential neighborhood with extremely limited parking.  When I arrived Chris offered to move his vehicle and let me take the parking space while Lisa and I headed to the beach.  Upon arrival with our toes in the sand Lisa marked off the area they had been sitting and by this time the tide had come in and the section of beach was awash.  Lisa let me know that I was looking for a chunky silver wedding band.  I immediately got to work scanning the area in a spiral pattern working outward from where they had been sitting.  It didn’t take long and after 5 minutes got a screaming signal of BIG silver.  One deep scoop later Chris was reunited with his ring and the nearby beach-go-ers who had been observing were all cheers.

I woke up that morning and like a lot of us checked my phone.  I had a text from Allison asking if I still work with the Ringer Finders.  I let her know that I was a proud member and asked her about how I might.  She told me the story of how she had gone to the beach with friends and before going in the water she had taken her two rings and gold bracelet off and put them on her towel.  When she exited the water she grabbed her towel without thinking.  Instant recognition of whet she had just done as the jewelry went flying!  She described how she and her friends searched the sand but were unable to find anything.

I asked what beach this took place at and she told me Waimea beach.  Waimea is famous for its big wave (30 ft or more) surfing but what a lot of people don’t know it that is has very deep and very soft sand and that anything dropped in to that sand can vanish instantly.  I told her I would meet her at the beach but that it would take me close to 90 minutes to drive there as I lived on the opposite side of the island.  After meeting her at Waimea she took me to the area the jewelry was lost and I began detecting.  We drew a crowd but they were merely curious and rooting for Allison to get her stuff back.  After a few minutes out into the scoop popped one ring.  The a couple minutes later came the second ring and finally the gold bracelet to the cheers of the small crowd looking on!  I’ve never see a smile like the one Allison had on her face when she had all her stuff back.

I got a call from Josh who was directed to me after contacting another Ringfinder.  Josh and his family were visiting from the Massachsuetts. In the process of unloading all the necessary beach paraphenalia they had lost the car keys to their rental car.  He called the rental company and they informed him there would be a $500 replacement cost to get new keys to Josh.  That’s when Josh decided to try the better option to call RingFinders.  After he called I told him it would only take 20 minutes and I headed out to meet him.

Once there Josh pointed out the area they thought the keys were and we went to work.  I gridded off the path from the car to the beach chairs and began detecting the area.  After 15 minutes and collecting pop tops and bottle caps so I got a trashy but strong signal.  Scooped the target and sure enough in the scoop were the Key FOB to the rental car.  Catastophy averted.

It started as a normal day.  I headed to the beach for some metal detecting and relaxation.  That day I chose Waikiki Beach and left before dawn.  I hadn’t been on the sand more than 10 minutes when Adam, a surfing instructor, came up to me and asked “do you know how to use a metal detector?”.  I was taken aback a bit but answered that “I’ve been doing this for a number of years.  He then began to explain he had lost his ring in the late afternoon the day before.  He knew the aprox. location in the dry sand he had lost his ring and after some experimentation with a borrowed metal detector he gave up realizing he had no idea how to use it.  That explained his first question to me about if I knew how to use my metal detector.  I headed to the area he indicated.  The area was small but full of a lot of trash and iron.  It took a good 20 minutes to sort out all the targets but knowing that the ring was tungsten carbide I knew it would be a lower sounding contact.  Finally I locked on to the sound I wanted, which was outside the area indicated as where it was lost.  Only plausible explanation was as it was a high traffic area the ring had been kicked outside the area we were originally searching.  Adam was overjoyed to get his wedding band back where it belongs.