: A Beachside Miracle: Recovering Chris’s Lost Wedding Ring at Oxnard Shores
This adventure started with a call from Sue about her daughter-in-law Rachel loosing her engagement ring in west Twin Lake in Elsworth Mi while on vacation. Her Daughter-in-law was floating on a tube and the diamond caught on the tube and got pulled off her finger. They had taken a pontoon out to the a sandbar on the lake and anchored to let the kids play.
I arranged to go to the location after work. Even thought this is a small lake in a small town I did not want to take a chance on another detectorist getting the ring before I could find it. The drive up was an hour and a half, so I ended getting to the location at 7:30 pm. I had about 3 hours light before it got dark. Sue had sent me a hand drawn picture of the approximate location they were at. I took my boat out to the location and started a grid search of the area. I was noticing not very many foot prints in the area. I searched about an hour with no luck. I called Sue from the lake trying to get a better location. She ended up sending me a bunch of pictures, but due to bad cell service only 3 came through. One of the pictures I could line up a line of sight and get an approximate location. I got to the new area and was finding the water to deep compared to the picture. After an hour grid searching I came across a small little gravel hump about 3 feet across. I knew at that point this was the spot I was looking for. About 30 seconds later I got the nice sweet tone I was looking for and it was the ring. Sue and the rest of the family were back down state about 4 hours. I had to go down state the following weekend. Sue came to my location to get the ring. She gave it back to her daughter-in-law for her birthday on 8-3-21.
Here is the text from Sue after returning the ring.
“It is with much thanks and appreciation for all the help of Clare in finding my daughter in laws ring that was lost while she was on vacation . His compassion patience and kindness in finding the ring made my daughter in laws birthday surreal . I can’t say enough about TheRingFinders”.
I thank Sue for trusting me to find this valuable ring and the generous reward.
When Danielle googled “how to find a ring in ocean” the search returned a blog from the ring finders (it was the first search result)! Then a search for Ring Finders Falmouth led her to my past blogs and contact information.
I received a call from Danielle with a tale of loosing a ring her dad given her 10 years ago. “I look up to and care deeply for my father and I also sentimental feelings in that the ring reminds me of home (where I’m from, in New Jersey).”
The ring was the second ring she had lost, the first was lost in an almost identical situation 10 years ago (playing football in the water at the beach). She vowed to never wear a ring again when doing that, and was pretty good for a number of years before she slipped up. This time the sea was at high tide and the waves were one footers. But I knew the beach and thought I could find it, if Danielle lost the ring where she thought it came off her finger.
I showed up and was getting ready for the search when Danielle and her friend Kelly showed up to point out the area. The help was instrumental in my finding of the ring. I had only minutes before the tide reached its peak height. I started to search as far out as I could go and worked my way toward the shore. I did not hear a signal until my 5th pass when I heard it – the sound that I was sure was the ring – and it was.
I did not remove the ring from my scoop, I left that to Danielle. It added just a bit more to the ordeal that I am sure will be remembered for some time to come.
Nathan was body surfing at Mission beach when he realized that he was wearing his wedding ring, not something he normally does. In checking the ring to see how tight it was fitting, it came right off and dropped into waist deep surf. With our surf, it will disappear in a second, so, no way to spot it. A sad Nathan now had to go confess to the wife that his wedding band is gone. His wife wasn’t satisfied with accepting that fate, so, she found TheRingFinders.com on a search and contacted me for help. The ring was lost at a +4 foot tide, so, a minus .7 tide at 5:14 am was just the ticket for this search. Nathan met me at 3:15 am and showed me the search area. He even came out in the surf and helped me keep on my grid pattern. This section of beach was real clean. An hour and half later, I had only found 3 non-ferrous targets, 2 pull tabs and a junk ring. At that point I had changed direction on my grid and now went north-south instead of my earlier east-west. Second pass doing this in ankle deep or less water, and another 16 pull tab reading on my Equinox. Only this time, it looked this was going to be
Nathan’s ring. I called him over, and by the light of his flashlight, he saw it was indeed his ring. He now would have a much happier conversation with his wife when he got home. Next month is their 2nd wedding anniversary, so, this recovery will help the ring story continue into chapter 3. A pleasure to meet you Nathan, and thank you for the reward.
Received a Wednesday morning text from Felix who found me in the Ring Finder directory. I broke away from work and gave him a quick call to allow him to fill me in on the details of his wife’s lost ring. Apparently his wife, Kim, was at a community farm in Phoenixville, PA with her daughter the day before picking up her weekly veggie share. Felix told me both his wife and daughter saw the ring fall off her finger while they were picking and bagging their veggies. He shared that the area where it dropped was 4-6 inch high farm field grass and that both his wife and daughter spent hours searching for it with no success. I conveyed to him that I was quite confident I could find it for them and we agreed to meet at that farm at 5 pm later that same day.
I met kim at the farm and she showed the exact area where she felt and saw it come off her finger. The area consisted of rows of raised vegetable laden mounds each separated by 6 feet of 4-6 inch farm field grass. Kim knew exactly where the ring came off…even showed me the basil plant she had picked just prior to seeing her ring slip off. It fell off when she was putting the basil in a bag and she tried to catch it before it hit the ground. Her daughter saw the falling ring as well. She was amazed/surprised/concerned about not finding her beautiful white gold anniversary ring…she just figured she can’t see it in tall grass. At this point I’m figuring 3 minutes max…I’m going to find this thing! Well after 15 minutes of searching both sides of the basil mound and the basil mound itself I was starting to question whether it was actually there. I took my own gold ring off several times to check my equipment and convince kim that if I’m over it I’m not going to miss it.
Well after several passes of the area she was convinced the ring was I figured its time to expand the search area. I moved over an entire row to the adjacent grassy lane….maybe 15- 20 feet from where she was convinced it dropped and finally hear the beautiful signal I had been looking for. I hadn’t even bent over yet and the ring still wasn’t visible beneath the grass but I knew what it was! I gave Kim a big smile and bent down to part the grass…there was her big gorgeous ring! We laughed and high fived…she couldn’t believe how far it was from where she thought it fell. I truly live for the joy I brought her by putting that ring back in her possession!
I was out detecting with a buddy, when a guy named Ian rides his bike up to me and asks if I could possibly search for his wife’s lost wedding band at Cardiff State Beach. I said I’d be happy to do it and that to let me know when we could meet there and conduct the search. He said it would take him a bit to bike there and would text me when he was available. I got the text, actually found a parking spot, and met him at the location out on a busy beach. Ian and his wife were here visiting from a sweltering Tucson, AZ and were enjoying the beach yesterday, when while applying skin lotion. the ring slipped off into the dry sand and vanished. They
sifted with fingers for several hours, but, no luck. Looking for a small gold ring, the signal can be pretty low on the scale and weak as well. I figured I’d be digging foil for a while, but, actually didn’t get many signals and ended up expanding the search area a bit more than we thought we would have to. I finally got a weak, but, repeatable 7 on my Equinox and after a couple of scoops, had the ring in my hand. A happy Ian can now go back and surprise his wife of 15 years with her ring….oh, and it’s her birthday today! Happy Birthday and ring reunion! A pleasure to meet you Ian and thank you for the reward.
Jordan was visiting here from out of town and went to the beach with a friend. They were throwing the football around a bit when disaster struck. One of Jordan’s throws was more than just the football. His special ring went with the ball and ended up in waist deep water. Jordan had already left town and returned home when I got a call from his mother Silvia asking if I could help recover it. Surf losses are never a sure thing, but, this sounded fairly straight forward even though it had been a couple of days. At the time of the call, the tide was not in my favor, so, I decided to search a bit after midnight to take advantage of a nice low tide at 2:30 am. The water level at that point should be about 4 feet shallower that when it was lost, so, I was hoping for a wet sand hunt. In getting the details about the ring, I found it certainly was a special ring! It was purchased by Jordan’s grandmother as a wedding gift to Jordan’s father on his wedding day. Not an actual wedding ring, but, a wonderful gift none the less. It’s an 18K, custom, one-of-a-kind beauty that was made in Bolivia and eventually was passed down to Jordan who was devastated that it was lost. This just had to be found! With just a map with an X on it to go by, I started my grid at the south end of the search area. After about an hour and a half of mid-slope to knee deep surf I got my umpteenth pull tab signal (16 on the Equinox) in ankle deep water, but, was happy to see Jordan’s ring in the bottom instead. I texted Silvia that the lost had been found, and that I’d contact her later in the morning after I got some sleep. Jordan’s sister Nicolette lives close by and was able to come by yesterday, pick up the ring, and pose for the photo with Jordan’s football friend. I’m happy everything worked out well, and thank you for the reward.
Anna contacted me about 8:30am saying that her husband of 5 days lost his wedding ring when he shook water off his hand, and the ring went flying off. They’re honeymooning here from Boston and would be leaving the next day, so, they were hoping I could find his ring before they left. Being July 3rd, Coronado has a big parade starting at 10am and would be very crowded soon
, so, I had to get on my horse and ride! The trip over wasn’t too bad until I got into town where the parade was to take place. I eventually got over to the beach about an hour later, and tried to find a parking spot. None to be had anywhere close, so, I ended up parking a bit over a mile away. I finally get to the meeting spot in the dry sand where the ring was lost and got the low down on how it was lost and about where it should be. Sure enough, after a couple of scrap aluminum targets in 2-3 minutes, I got a nice solid 11 on my Equinox and pulled the ring out of it’s sandy resting spot. Now the happy newlyweds can head out and continue their life together with the rings they came with. A pleasure to meet you both and thank you for the reward.