Hi every one, this is my first blog and I’ve decided to report on this years annual Minelab Owners (MLO) rally. This year we returned to Corfe Dorset England where all our fields seem to overlook the very historic Corfe Castle.
Corfe castle sits on a prominent hill at a natural pass through the Purbeck hills. This pass has always had strategic importance, and castles have been built here to guard it since Saxon times (if not earlier). The ruins you see today are the result of the 17th Century civil war, when it systematically destroyed in 1646 by the parliamentary Roundheads.
With all this rich history, finds have always been prolific on this metal detecting rally, and this year was no exception. Everyone seemed to find something of interest. There where lots of Celtic Roman, Medieval and Tudor coins found. A lot more than last year, which was probably due to more moisture in the ground. My best E-TRAC find was a Celtic silver stater dating to around the birth of Christ. My example was pretty poor compared to others found, but was still very pleasing.
Every year we get a good influx of European visitors, and this was no exception, including a good contingent of Dutch and German detectorists. North American detectorist were also represented, Jim Leonard from the US and Scott from Canada both found Roman and medieval coins.
Minelab Ireland continued their support for this Rally sending Des Dunn and Finbarr Lordan to give on-hand customer support. Minelab also very generously donated loads of prizes for the raffle, including the top prize, a brand new E-TRAC.
Saturday evening was the main social get-together, with food laid on by Gwen and Tony Hunt. This year the entertainment was supplied by Gary Brun as the ‘master of ceremonies’, dressed in drag, drawing the raffle prizes. Each winner then had to tell a joke to the audience, or give him a kiss. I fortunately didn’t win anything, so escaped any intimacy… others weren’t so lucky!
The evening finally concluded with the drawing of the main prize, the E-TRAC. Finbarr drew the winning ticket, and the winner was announced, a very lucky Lawrence Kittle.
The timing of this rally was just after the release of Minelab’s new GPX detectors, and we had two of the new machines on hand. On Sunday Neil Jones took the GPX 5000 on the high ridge over looking Corfe castle. After a short time I started hearing rumours that Neil was finding a lot of Roman coins, so we made our way up the hill to film him. When we got to him there was a small crowd of on lookers watching him digging his twelfth coin. We grabbed the camcorder and caught this and the discovery of the subsequent coin on film. This film can be seen on MLOtv.com.
The area he was finding coins had previously been worked to death. But the GPX 5000 had revitalised the detecting for Neil, who found thirteen coins in just a few hours of searching.
Next year's 2011 Corfe rally has already been confirmed, so please visit minelabowners.com for details nearer the time.
Now go out and find something!
Gordon Heritage
Comments
Out of interest what is the main detector used at rallies such as this? Its a little hard for us colonialists to get our heads around the age of things you talk about but it seems like a lot of fun looking for things that are so old.
Yes the age thing can be a bit mind blowing, although some UK detectorists have become blasé (almost jaded) about finding two thousand year old coins. I regularly hear comments like "just a grot" or "hedge fodder" when finding poor condition Roman coins. And even I consider everything up to 300 years old as modern, which I know annoys our American rally visitors.
And you're not kidding about the raffle, I've never been so pleased to be a loser.... Pat wasn't as lucky though !