This year over Easter Break, my family and I decided to head south and get away from all the winter drama we’ve had here at home. We were just finishing up getting about 10 inches of snow when we left home. It has been a long winter, and I was eager to get my Minelab E-TRAC out and start finding some loot. After about a 10 hour ride in the car, we arrived at our destination.
My first spot it hit was a local park, which yielded some clad and a Wheat Penny. Not quite what I expected so far, but I was happy just being outside and not freezing from wind or snow.
Later that day, we arrived at another spot, which I had no idea it held such awesome finds. I honestly wasn’t going to hunt it, until my wife had suggested that I do, since we weren’t doing anything anyway. I agreed, and figured I’d pass some more time outside swinging my machine. Heck, maybe there’d at least be a toy car or something in the ground, right? I set a goal at the beginning of the year, I wanted to find a Seated Liberty coin. I had no idea what was in store…
Then it happened. I got a beautiful tone in my headphones, it was solid and repeating. 12-47 12-48. All directions, the same sound, the same numbers. I was a little excited, but I know that regular quarters sometimes can sound like silver too, so I really had no idea what was to come. I dug a small plug, and there it was, the sight we all love to see, that glow of silver in the plug. Being there were many others around the area, I worked quickly, took a very quick look at my find without cleaning it off, and I figured it was a Washington Quarter due to how nice the detail was on the part I could see. In my pouch it went. Feeling happy, I replaced my plug and swung some more. Another good hit! Same as before, solid all around, beautiful high tone. I dug the plug, and there it was. Round and dull, larger than a quarter, but not silver. It clicked right away. I had just found my very first Large Cent! Again, not wanting to yell and jump around because of the others around me, I placed it in my pouch. Now I was shaking. Then it clicked in my head, if I had just found a large cent, maybe that wasn’t a Washington Quarter in my pouch. I had to look again. Trying to be as careful as possible, I looked closer at my quarter, and sure enough, it wasn’t a Washington Quarter at all! It was a Seated Liberty in beautiful condition! I was grinning from ear to ear, trying so hard to contain myself. I told my wife, and she saw them also, and was almost as excited as me. I quickly replaced this plug and started swinging my detector more around the same area, knowing there was old treasure under our feet. Another signal, another Large Cent! Another signal, and this one was a Seated Half Dime! Soon another signal, a Seated Dime! A couple minutes later, I got another good signal mixed with an iron signal. After searching the plug, I found a tiny piece of a square nail. I began covering the hole back up, and my wife had actually told me, “No, that’s not what the sound was, keep looking!” She was as anxious as me about finding these! Sure enough, after re-checking my plug, we found it. Another Half Dime!
The sky was now getting dark, and it was time to retire for the day. It was hard to do, but I knew I’d get a chance to come back the next day, and whatever was in the ground would still be there in the morning. Needless to say, it was very hard to sleep that night.
The next morning, bright and early, I returned. It seemed I cleaned the spot out pretty well with my E-TRAC last night, so I began expanding my search and gridding off areas around my honey hole spot, going over the area one direction, then criss-crossing it to see if I would get any hits in the same area from another direction. Then again, a strong high tone. I dug my plug, and out it popped. At first it looked like a silver slug, but upon closer inspection, it was another Half Dime, my oldest coin to date, 1839. It was much more worn than the other seated liberty coins I had found last night, but just as exciting!
We spent the rest of the day searching the area, and we ended up finding some other cool relics, such as a silver spoon, a Tranter bullet, and 3 flat buttons with the loop still intact on the backside. I
never imagined I’d have this kind of luck on Easter Vacation, not in a million years. I will never doubt my E-TRAC, all of my silver signals and button signals came in clear and loud. If it’s in the ground, the E-TRAC will sniff it out. Thank you to Minelab for creating such a wonderful machine, I’ll be a customer for life, especially after that weekend!
Your Customer For Life,
Ron L. - Wisconsin, USA
