7797/20738
I got my metal detector and would just like to say to anyone who has worked on my house in the last 300 years, I've found the nails you left in my garden. Come round and get them any time you like.
The machine arrived this afternoon and we gave it a road test as soon as we'd finished the film we were watching. I put it together pretty easily, though the coil bit is hard to tighten up so that it doesn't move around - maybe it's meant to. I don't really know very much about metal detecting and I was too keen to get out there to read the manual, but the buttons are fairly self-explanatory and it distinguishes between different kinds of metal to some extent, so low readings are probably iron and unlikely to be anything too interesting, where if you get a beep higher up the scale then you might have some treasure. Or accidentally have got your spade too close to the device.
I have a little wand device too that helps pinpoint the finds and Ernie took charge of that. It was impressive how accurate these devices were and how they could pinpoint nails that were quite some way under the earth. I got a couple of higher readings, but they turned out to be nails or bits of keys or other rusted and unidentifiable objects (though some of the nails did look like they might be pretty old - the square headed ones. I still threw them away). Out with Phoebe after dinner we got a strong response on the lawn and I dug down maybe 20cm and hit something solid. Was it a treasure chest? It'd be good to find something to pay back the investment I'd made straight away.
It was big and sounded a bit hollow when I tapped it. It didn't strike me at the time that it might be a WWII bomb, but I correctly ascertained that it was a mystery pipe. It was headed away from the annexe out towards next door and I couldn't really see what it might have been there for. I suspected it was out of use, but didn't want to dick around with it too much in case it was full of shit. There used to be a tannery on the property next door (and this was once a single residence) so I think it might have been something to do with that.
I enjoyed it all anyway, even though I thought we were unlucky not even to find a single coin or dubloon or lost crown. It is satisfying to have fulfilled a childhood dream and own a metal detector though. I am hear to tell you that your dreams can come true. And sometimes they could easily have come true ten or twenty years ago, but you forgot about them or couldn't be arsed.
I will work my way up to getting out into the wild with it though, just in case I meet a real detectorist who will laugh at my lack of knowledge and my slightly limp coil (I really tightened all the screws, but it still dips - is it meant to?). If I haven't found Excalibur or the Holy Grail in the first week or so it's going in the garage.
