I am up too, drinking a cup of coffe and ready to go down to my boat. Wind is still, I can see clouds moving fast, and I am sure the water is way up. Actually looks and feels quiet outside. Too quiet!

If you go to Tnet and look at the Cache thread and click on "Pirate treasure trying to get a permit to dig" you will see the whole story. Bogdogdad asked me to check it out. I went over the spot with my Pulse Star and it pegged the needle. That has never happened before. It also showed non-ferrous. I offered to dig it up at night but Tim wanted to try the legal way first. It didn't work. The state said "let it sit there forever". Now its too late to go the clandestine route. This area is called Rocky Bluff and it is a well known pirate camp. Just go to that waterfront bar and grill next to the bridge- Woody's, and ask. Everybody knows about it. There was a treasure chest dug up in the 1930's. There are 2 more.

Here is a newspaper article about Tim. He is quite a guy! Very interesting article.
www.tampabay.com/features/humaninterest/article1243831.ece

There is no way to get a permit to dig near an interstate bridge footer or even within a couple of hundred yards of one. Asking was the first mistake and allerting them was the second. Now if anything that resembles a treasure hunter or detection equipment will be investigated with extreme prejudice. If you so much as anchor close to that area you will be pounced on like a cat with a mouse, and you are the mouse. I have been to Woody's many times. It is one of our favorite spots. We go there by dink and the food and entertainment are both great. It is also a short Golf Car ride from the house if we choose to go that way.

Today was a working day for the boat. It is in a slip and the next step was to repair the anchor lines and get the bent anchor ready to take to the welding shop so I can replace the bent shank. It bent the same as the other one so I'll just make another shank and have it welded on the anchor. I had to braid two anchor lines. One had broken and the second was only a single twist from breaking. Not wanting to shorten the anchor lines by cutting the first 50 or so feet off the line I decided to splice them together. As luck would have it I had loaned out my line splicer and fids so I had to do it the old fashioned way and braid them without the splicer and fids.

I had several people stop by at the dock to gab and look at Feather. Now that we have the boat at a dock we are having a steady stream of visitors. Now all I have to do is start installing the new appliances, carpet, get both engines going and do a little pretty up work. The cleaning on the topside today got a lot of attention. When she is cleaned up she really looks good. 15 months on the hook and several storms, lots of abuse and neglect have taken a toll. A little elbow grease along with a little money and she will look great again. I have to get her sides cleaned and bleached. Lots of mold and dirt look worse than it really is. I even cleaned the anchor lines of the nasty black river mud that stained them so they smelled bad and looked worse.

It looks like I may be able to leave Feather in the slip. She is very long and sticks out quite a bit but the canal is still about 250 to 300 feet wide behind me. Plenty of room to swing out around me without causing any trouble. I have talke to the marina dockmaster and he has no problem and thinks the boat is just fine the way it is. Several other boaters who have boats along the same docks said they also see no problem with her sitting there. We'll see what happens when the snowbirds come back down. Some of them can not even get out of their slip without hitting something. Let's see what happens when they have a 60 foot target in front of them.

hope all on the gulf side are ok!!!

whitefeather, sounds like the boat was ok but i imagine it wasn't a real good feeling seeing it had been "re-located"

salvor6, followed bogdogdads thread on tnet for a while! very determined guy!!!!!

we didnt get much erosion over here(cocoa beach) and if we did it didnt last long.
chuck

Double click posts your post twice. I've done it several times but usually go back and edit one with pictures.

Speaking of pictures, I could not get to many during the storm or when I was rescuing the boat because my cellphone had been wet once before and I keep it in a sandwhich baggie to keep it dry when it is raining. Thus, not many pictures in the rain. But, I did get a few.




Between bands of rain and wind I launched the dink and rescued Feather.

Hooking up to the dink with Feather wandering around in the background.

The water was about 2.8 feet above normal high tide. What a day!

well, it doesnt look like its sticking out enough to be a problem!

I don't think so either. The canal is about 300 or so feet wide and that leaves about 250 feet or more between my swim platform and the other shore.



Hey Pete, I think your silver treasure is somewhere near the other end of this bridge. This is the southbound lanes coming up river on the south shore of the Manatee River.

Ya, its there. There is also a lot more but there is so much trash out there that its difficult to find the good stuff. This is a popular spot for fishermen and crack heads.

I had heard of that story since I was a kid. Had always wanted to check it out, and when I was working for a diesel repair place, I ran up to past this point up the yet unused bridge, to fix a grader or some kind of diesel powered road builder. I think it was 1980, and looked at the area, and wondered exactly where to look. I have been to the Riverroo place right by the bridge on the North shore. Pete, thats cool that you found something. Too bad you cant legally dig it up. How you doing Pete?

Sounds like it's time to deploy the night ops dive team! Suit up boys... we're gonna go git sum!

im in!!! im sitting here waiting on the glue to dry after patching a hole in the bladder of a bcd i bought at a thrift store for $15.00. looks real nice but bladder has holes/rips on each side where the inflation nozzles are.
also got some wieght belts with wieghts, fins and some wetsuits all for less than $50.00. all i need to find now is a regulator/dive guage setup and i can get serious.

Rats! I'm not allowed to go out diving at night. Besides, it's scarry in the dark with all those pirates out rowing around looking for someone trying to steal their treasure!

Well, we dodged the Izaac bullet! I went down to look at the beach and it was eroded! I shot back home and grabbed my Excal with the 15" coil. I spent about 30 minutes treasure hunting, had to be home to start cooking chicken, so it would be ready by the time Lynn got home. First thing I found was a piece of aluminum mesh, then the next 17-18 targets were all coins, then a piece of lead, then a piece of aluminum can, then an Aruba 5 cent. I had been low on the beach with the first 18, and worked back up 8 feet higher, so I went back down and went farther, and found several more coins. All were crusty or had been there for a while. The Aruba coin was on the surface, (as many of the others) and I thought it was a toe ring because it sounded like iron, and only the rim was showing. Coins on the top and all crusty means the sand is being eroded, I will be there tomorrow and find some jewelry. And of course some more coins. Nothing silver, 6 quarters, 6 dimes, 6 pennies 2 nickels, and the Aruba 5 cent. 2 pieces of lead, a couple aluminum pieces. Russ, here is what the Brinleys Shipwreck Rum looks like-empty!

Todays booty Sorry picture is blurry, was too dark and flash went off, it cant focus if too dark.

back side of Aruba 5 cent Never saw one before. It is smaller than a dime, but as thick as a nickel.

Front side

nice greenies! very little erosion over here and i had to run and gun to find it, most places had been sanded in. my finds look alot like yours but i did not find any gold!!!

Seeker41 where are you at? I know it is calm on the East Coast of Florida now. We have had a lot of sanding in or just no sand movement here. Debby got some moving I am sure, but I was busy working on my boat. Welcome!