Thank you everyone for your comments and encouragements!
I checked the tracking number today and the pod is due to be delivered to ML USA tomorrow. I'm wishing I didn't use their label (UPS Ground) and just paid for USPS two-day!
Bob'ke: I moved to the bay area of California a few years ago. I finally purchased the EQ800 in front of my first holiday trip to Lake Tahoe area before the snow came - I lived in the US midwest for most of my life and had enough snow to last me many more years. The Northern Nevada desert was a side trip to see the sites, Carson, Virginia City, and the surrounding desert and some detecting on public land. The beach is closer to home, back in the bay area, as I am still learning both where to go detecting and how to use the machine. The detector does live in the trunk (boot) of the car (collapse the rod) except when I take the pod inside to charge.
Not having anything to compare it to, I am really impressed when using the detector. I'm still digging most every target to see what it is (no big finds (lots of garbage, caps, aluminum, iron, pennies, modern coins) but one beach I was at had very few hits. It's a public beach and I am sure detected quite heavily. There is a narrow streak of black sand there, quite a ways up from the shore. It was in this sand (using the stock Beach 1 and 2) that I started to find the coins down about 4-6" and they were in bad shape, which tells me others couldn't find them for some time.
Now I'm just waiting (and trying to learn how to research properly to find Northern CA/Nevada sites) to get out there again to look for treasure and do more prospecting