Hell no gold fillings I take
Went for a wade at a grubby little beach where they used sit offshore and âplinkâ with muskets at whiskey bottles on the rocks.
Usual old decimals and modern chaff, tonne of lead, highlight was (initially) the backplate of a gold plated watch, only mark is â632â stamped on the back, barely held together by gold leaf in places with pretty much all the copper and workings rotted away from inside.
Also wheedled a big fat silver ring out of the stinky mud under the seaweed - Real thick spongy oxide layer but after a couple of hours in the ammonia and a sniff with the brass wheel on the dremel it started looking like someone loved it again - Was then I noticed it had a hallmark.
Really soft impression, but under the scope the head of Mr. Leopard popped out , wearing a crown, no less. Pre 1822!
Boom!
Thereâs a makers mark, but thatâs too far gone unfortunately.
Also another mussel shell sinker, 1971 Brit 10p (much bigger than I remember as a kid), bullet and a home made copper button with hex nut âsolderedâ onto the back, this could be relatively modern, but I see that hex nuts were being produced in the 1880âs so no idea. A novelty piece anyway.
Accidentally snagged a muskie too during the sinker frenzy 
A fun hunt, made more entertaining watching the kids learning to sail get skittled every time a squall came up the inlet.
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Iâm just over 23kg in lead since my Last visit to the scrapie all money in the bank âŚ
wheres there is lead their is gold you,ve just not found it yet, nice chunky ring.
Got to the stage the suspension probably wouldnât survive the trip to Kamo to cash in the grey matter. Three 10L buckets and a nail box all chocka and overflowing onto the garage floor.
@roy1954 Already had my golds from here 
Was hoping itâd been refreshed over the last year, but itâs only the locals who use this beach really, 3 people is a busy day here.
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Two early morning hunts here. Mix of beach and mudflats, worked the flats on the higher than normal tide to force me to get out of my rut of barrelling straight out to the ring-zone.
Waitangi Day: Hit the local at 0330, few figures lurking in the shadows around town, so I tucked myself out of sight and car headlight range. First hole was a silver necklace - not sure how to clean this, might just leave it as is. Then about $4 in goldies. After an hour, my spidey-senses werenât happy so I bailed and headed out onto the flats - No-one can sneak up on me there (not that theyâd take their Converse AllStars out there anyway). The tide was about halfway in from where I normally hunt, and by the starlight and the occasional splash I worked the edge of the incoming water in about 200m runs which gave me new ground each line. Hopes were high that I had a coin spill of half crowns, but turned out to be manky, manky 50âs. Did turn up a silver 6d though. Wanted a ring, but the battery started its death wail (Excal swingers will know of what I speak) and since the dawn had well and truly broken, I headed home.
Thursday morning, town was a lot quieter and after a couple of flypasts to check for nightcrawlers, I leapt out and down onto the beach. Few more goldiesâŚand a bicycle saddle (toy). Didnât find the rest of the bike.
At slack low, I decided to try a different bit of mud. Obviously untouched by the sheer volume of copper cladding, leads and old decimals. Hit a US coin spill where someone fell out of their dinghy when landing. Also a couple of silver shillings and a Mk2 cordite 303 cartridge. No date, but good old CAC. Trivia time: A little known activity of CAC was the commercial harvesting and canning of Toheroa. There, thatâs something you know now
Heard a nice deep target, turned out to be a copper bead off a necklace, metre away, another one. I wasnât about to spend all bloody night rebuilding the damn thing one bead at a time, so gave that area a wide berth 
The moderately good:
And some of the uglies (already boxed a lot of lead and copper/brass)
Part three is to revisit my goldmine swimming hole, with SCUBA and the Scubatector tomorrow. Have high hopes based on the wading results a couple of years ago. Zero vis, so will be an exercise in compass work - or repeated trips to the surface to see where I am!
This was last time I was there (this is a BS-Free image!):
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Wow⌠Good luck with that hunt MW
great stuff ,i would be chomping at the bit to get into that place.is that a us dog tag bottom right?
@roy1954 No, just some novelty bling personalised tag, was a guy from Samoa from memory
Onto the debrief:
Spent the first hour wading at the swimming hole to get an idea of how quickly the vault was being refreshed in the 2 years since I last visited - Itâs notâŚunless Iâve got some competition 
Only a couple of 5c pieces and a lone $2 and the rainbow toning on that tells me I must have missed it first time.
The sun was well up by the time I headed back inshore to kit up for the dive, but with the recent rains the vis was already down.
Bottle on, I headed straight out to my previous wading limit (nostril depth), took a bearing back to shore (conveniently near due North which made life easy) and one pace more to get me under the surface.
Dropped down onto my knees into the murk and started waving the wand. May as well have closed my eyes - even with the xenon torch on the side of my head, I had to bury my mask into the bottom to see it.
However the untapped vein of fresh loot quickly forced development of a fly by feel procedure: Pinpoint with the Excal, slide hand down to the coil and mark the spot, swing Excal out of the way, swap hands, with the hand previously marking the spot grabbing the pointer and isolating the target. Stick face within 5cm of the end of the pointer now going full whistle and try and see what the hell is there, while feeling through the silt trying to identify anything that could be the target !
Got quite good after a few coins and was maybe quicker than wading with the scoop.
Hit the thermocline at 3m and entered the fridge, felt like summer hadnât even happened and I reckon the temp dropped to about 11° Straight away the 3mm suit suddenly felt very thin and wasnât long before I pressed the compass against the mask to see the way home and headed back to base.
Got some strange looks from a couple that turned up after Iâd put the gear back in the car, seeing someone sitting in full February sun, with a fleece sweatshirt and fleece jacket over the topâŚshivering. 
One important thing was learned though, I donât have to wait for daytime to do this dive - whatever the sun is doing makes absolutely no difference on the bottom! Definitely need a few (lot) more lumens though!
Fulltime score: $25, 925 with fat CZ, 9ct triple Russian wedder and 2 stainless.
The rainbow toning makes a nice change from the beach coins.
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Now I reckon a dredge would work there
Toyed with the idea of an accidental landslip to dam it, then pumping the bugger out⌠After getting the smoker ready for all the eels!
been some stuff lost there over the years!!!
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Those Russian Rings or Rolling Rings are quite nice. Found a few Silver ones but never a gold one. Would never buy them as they just roll off your fingers like no tomorrow. Great find MW.
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Just twigged that the goldies date back nearly 30 years and that the $1 in the top centre of the pic was one of the first minted. Iâve been unconsciously tagging the goldies as âRecentâ at this spot.
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$25, silver and gold bloody good hunt good on ya.
Drifted south today into neighbouring southern territories as all the beaches up here are chocka with sand and Iâm sick of the sight of them.
Dawn therefore saw me on a little surf beach with Chris arriving shortly after, it was similar to all the ones up north in terms of fluffy sand, although I found a couple of small holes where the swirl had pulled the sand off back to pebbles - not a lot in these though, few coins, a bit of penknife, and a stainless karabiner that looks as though it had an exciting end to itâs life. Probably cross-loaded the gate with a large boat on the other end.
Chris headed off elsewhere, and it wasnât long after before I was also back on the road. Thereâs quiet hunts, and then thereâs too quiet.
Had a look at another beach, although the tide was well on itâs way in - and above the water was just more high banks of yellow fluffy silence, home only to tabs and tinfoil. Move on.
Ended up spending maybe 45 minutes in a small tributary, lots of light litter and the only heavy metal was a recent padlock. Pulled a .303 cartridge with an odd punch in the side, just above the rim. Seem to recall someone talking about these as feeder marks or something? Anyone remember who it was, or know what they are? Headstamp far too worn to get any details. 
At half tide a quick change of clothes and head inland to do some coin shooting in the Big Town with the ATPro (Just $1 & $2 thank you - Canât see the point in bending down for 10c! )
Started with a cocky and shameless sniping of Chrisâ local tot lot, few dollars there, before driving into town - Lots of playgrounds tucked away all over the place when you start looking. I think a couple had never seen a coil. Worked maybe 12-15, and a few park edges and carparks before being all swung out and heading north leaving a few toy cars behind to brighten some kiddies days.
Dirt soundly thrashed the beaches this time with a final score of $33 to 5.
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Revisited the Goldmine with upgraded lights (2x 250lm) - which made absolutely no difference.
Ended up turning them off (no sense in burning expensive batteries when they do F all) and just trundled around on the bottom with my eyes shut (seems to be more natural than having them open in pitch black)
Nothing more than a lone $2 this time, and the usual bag of caps and tabs, so calling this spot officially âEmptiedâ 
One of my least fun dives, not for any hazardous reasons, justâŚwell, tedious:
Dug another $10 out of a playground on the way home, so didnât feel too bad.
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For Christ sake I saw a least 2 rings in the vidđ
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What vid? âŚ
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