Tales From The Wanna Be Relic Hunter

[CPT_GhostLight]

Okay, now that I've set the bar and expectations low enough, here's the tales from one of my latest relic hunts. Our journey begins on a rare warm-up day between the on and off snow storms that is this years Colorado Winter. I get a call from one of my hunting partners who says we should go out before the next snow. Well I'm absolutely on board for that and ask where we're going. He says it's a surprize but bring a shotgun. WTF???!!! Then he says he was just kidding, sort of. ????!! ?

So I pick him up the next morning and we head South. Well this is good because the further South, the less frozen the ground. I then get told that we're going exploring and there were a few places he had always wanted to check out that may have some hidden history. Well that sounded all good so down the road we went.

The first stop was literally in the middle of nowhere with nothing but and old Mongomery Wards mailbox barely hanging on a wooden post and near two trees. I asked if he had some historical context about this location and my partner said, "No, I just noticed these trees just look out of place." Nkay, so we gear up and start poking around in the waist high weeds and cactus for an hour or so. It was hard to get in anywhere to swing the coil and at one point I just cranked up the sensitivity to 99 and just swung over the tops of the weeds. We managed find only a few old can pieces but nothing else. So on to the next location.

The second location looked more promising. It had a stone chimney and a few standing buildings. I call them buildings, but I'm pretty sure they were livestock stables at one time. There weren't any no tresspassing signs and the fence along the road was long downed so we geared up again and hit the field.  We weren't finding much new or old just some iron trash, so I moseyed on over to check out the "buildings". As I got closer, I actually hit two modern zinc pennies about six feet apart. What??? Those things follow me everywhere! ?

I was just getting nails, wire, and similar iron junk and decided to check inside the shacks. This is when things took a turn to the darkside and I was wishing I had brought a shotgun with me! The insides of the shacks were strewn with empty plastic water bottles, modern food cans, dirty sleeping bags and matresses, articles of modern men's, women's, and children's clothing, toys, empty travel bags, and a bunch of used syringes everywhere. There were also a half a dozen recently fired .45 caliber pistol cartridges on the ground in one of the shacks. As I went out to find my partner to tell him what I found, I noticed two large black SUVs parked about a quarter mile away on each end of the dirt road that led into the area. "Oh SH**!", I thought. We were obviously being watched. I found my partner and told him what I found and pointed out the SUVs. I said,"what do you want to do?" He said, "Let's get the F*** out of here!" So we nonchalantly packed up the gear and calmly rolled on down the road past one of the SUVs. As we made it to the exit road there was a parked black car with two guys sitting in it. As we turned to drive off, the driver in the black car flashed us the peace sign and my partner flashed it back which I assumed meant we could go. We cruised on down the road and nobody followed us, but I'm pretty sure we had stumbled upon a stop on the Coyote Super Highway! ?

After a little while, my partner said he had one more place nearby if I wanted to check it out. I thought about it a while and decided it couldn't be any worse than where we just were... or could it?

The next place, thankfully, was a place that many people he knew had hunted before and often, so I figured it might be a little safer even if it was pretty much picked over. This was an old train depot that had operated from the end of the 1800s to about 1955 and then was levelled in the 1960s. With a sigh of relief, we geared up once more went detecting, although I looked up every now and then to see if there were any SUVs around.

Well the place was very picked over but there were still some interesting finds. The only coin I found was a 1960 copper Memorial penny, but I did find some older buttons, some railroad spikes (I love those for some reason), a couple of old electical wire insulators, and a Rockford A1 silver plated spoon (circa 1882-1925). I also found something that has me completely confounded. It's the "greyhound" shaped object. It is non-magnetic metal and rang up 69-72 on the D2. It looks like and is heavy like lead. It is old and cracked and on the broken end it's black and crytaline looking inside. I was wondering if it was a tree root that somehow got covered with molten lead or something. I can't figure this one out.

Well long story short, be careful out there when exploring off the beaten path. You never know what or who you will run into. Thanks for taking the time to read all this. ?

 

[Tom_in_CA]

Even though it was not riddled with older coins, yet :  It is great pix and great play-by-play.   Well done !

[abenson]

Nice finds and great story. Thanks for sharing

[F350Platinum]

Outstanding tale and photos, Cap'n! ? The best (and most harrowing) story I've read in a while.

You are a relic hunter, without a cream puff location like I tend to get, I'm pretty sure that's what you will find. Looks good to me!

There are "staff" houses on some of the permissions I hunt, about all I've ever found good was one 1925 Mercury dime. I think I gave it to the landowner. Usually all I get in those spots is junk silverware, old rusted teapots, sardine cans, beer cans, and butt cream tubes. ? 

[rvpopeye]

Good readin' and finds of all kinds !

[JCR]

Your Greyhound maybe cast Zinc/White metal. Perhaps a hood ornament.

[F350Platinum]

Ford did make a vehicle in the 1930s called the Greyhound:

Here's the hood ornament.

[strick]

The navy button. Love finding those. 

Strick

[Valens Legacy]

Nice hunt with a lot of interesting items.

Did you find those railroad spikes at the tracks or the old building, I'm just asking so I won't be surprised when the next train derails out there.

Just kidding and good luck on your next outing.