11/26/18 Report - Mysterious Tunnels Discovered. Treasure Hunter Can't Present Coins to Court. Florida Shoreline Change Database. Plastic in Whales.

Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.

More evidence has emerged of a mysterious network of tunnels beneath the historic neighborhood of Ybor City in Tampa, Fla.

Earlier this week, architect Gerry Curts was on site showing pictures and offering descriptions of one of the tunnels, Fox 13 reported. He said that a new opening to the tunnels was revealed during demolition work by developers planning an office building./..

Mormino speculated that the tunnels may have been part of a network that transported Chinese prostitutes from Cuba to the Port of Tampa to Ybor City in the early 1900s, but added that we may never discover their real use. "The tunnels of Ybor City represent one of the great riddles and mysteries," he said...

Here is the link for more about that.

https://www.foxnews.com/science/mysterious-tunnels-discovered-in-florida

---

COLUMBUS (AP) — A treasure hunter has taken back a pledge to turn over 500 missing coins just days after he promised to deliver the coins minted from gold found in a shipwreck off the South Carolina coast.

The Columbus Dispatch reports Tommy Thompson agreed on Wednesday to deliver the coins to a court-appointed receiver by Sunday to settle a lawsuit brought by an investor.

The paper says the deal fell apart Friday when Thompson said he has no idea how to obtain the coins.

Thompson found the S.S. Central America in 1988 after convincing more than 100 investors to fund the voyage for nearly $13 million.

Thompson never repaid the investors. He became a fugitive and fled...

Here are a couple links.

https://www.limaohio.com/wire/state-wire/329120/treasure-hunter-flip-flops-over-returning-missing-gold-coins

https://www.dispatch.com/news/20181114/tommy-thompson-agrees-to-surrender-gold-coins-in-tentative-settlement

You might remember when a fugitive Tommy Thompson was apprehended in a Boca Raton hotel.

---

Here is a link that you can use to find some information on Florida shoreline changes.  Not all of it is up-to-date.

https://floridadep.gov/water/beaches/content/historic-shoreline-database

---

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — A dead whale that washed ashore in eastern Indonesia had a large lump of plastic waste in its stomach, including drinking cups, bottles and flip-flops, a park official said Tuesday, causing concern among environmentalists and government officials in one of the world’s largest plastic-polluting countries...

Santoso said researchers from wildlife conservation group WWF and the park’s conservation academy found about 5.9 kilograms (13 pounds) of plastic waste in the animal’s stomach containing 115 plastic cups, four plastic bottles, 25 plastic bags, 2 flip-flops, a nylon sack and more than 1,000 other assorted pieces of plastic...

For more - 

http://www.startribune.com/dead-whale-had-115-plastic-cups-2-flip-flops-in-its-stomach/500897282/

I'm always amazed by the number of flip flops and other plastic that washes up on the beaches on the Treasure Coast.

----

I've been busy with holiday activities already.  I always like the holidays.

Cooler weather is on the way.  The Treasure Coast surf is down to two to three feet, but the tides are still big.

We'll be getting more west and northwest winds, so I'm not expecting any improvement in beach detecting conditions.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

1 of 3

In this undated photo released by Akademi Komunitas Kelautan dan Perikanan Wakatobi (Wakatobi Marine and Fisheries Community Acad

emy or AKKP Wakatobi), researchers collect data of the carcass of a beached whale at Wakatobi National Park in South

6/1/14 Report - Mel Fisher Days, Hidden Cash Craze Spreads, Best Target Recovery Techniques & Valuable Secret

Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.

Each year a celebration is held to commemorate Mel Fisher’s famous 16 year search for the Spanish galleon Atocha which led to a $450 million dollar treasure discovery in the waters just off Key West. Events are scheduled from July 10-13 in Key West.

You can find more information and register for all events at www.MelFisherDays.com


The hidden cash craze has spread to cities across the United States.  It seemed to begin in San Francisco where one real estate millionaire hid cash filled envelopes and then provided clues by way of tweets from @HiddenCash.  Other cities are now involved, and it now seems that others have taken to hiding cash too. 

It might have been started by one person who wanted nothing more than to share some wealth, but I'm sure that it will become a method of advertising or promotion.  Below are links to some of the stories on this new craze.

http://article.wn.com/view/2014/05/30/Hidden_Cash_craze_on_Twitter_hits_Tampa/

It was rumored that one place to find hidden cash yesterday (Saturday) was Orlando.  Another Florida city was Tampa.

Check out @HiddenCash, as well as @Moolah Mystery.

Here are more links.

http://news.softpedia.com/news/Hidden-Cash-Phenomenon-Twitter-Clues-Lead-to-Envelopes-Stuffed-with-Money-444641.shtml

http://globalnews.ca/news/1365351/vancouver-the-latest-city-to-catch-on-to-the-twitter-cashscavenger-hunt/

http://austin.culturemap.com/news/city-life/05-30-14-company-hides-envelopes-of-cash-in-random-downtown-locales/

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-get-thee-to-hermosa-beach-hiddencash-seekers-20140531-story.html



In the US, credit cards carry a magnetic strip that is easy for criminals to duplicate.   Other countries, I understand, use cards that use microchips instead of the magnetic strips  The microchips are safer. 

Unlike magnetic strip cards that transfer a credit card number when they are swiped at a point-of-sale terminal, chip cards use a one-time code that moves between the chip and the retailer's register. The result is a transfer of data that is useless to anyone except the parties involved. Chip cards, say experts, are also nearly impossible to copy.

I said before that cash is becoming a thing of the past.  It might happen sooner than you or I expect.


The other day I said that I don't dig holes in parks or lawns but instead plug or probe and pop the item out of the ground. 

Detectorists should never leave a public area leaving signs that they were there - other than the fact the area should be cleaner.  And I'd say that real detectorists are pretty good about that.   Most of the  trouble comes from beginners or people that are just giving treasure hunting a try thinking that they are going to dig up a treasure chest or something and can't tell the difference in signals between a coin and a cannon.

Well, plugging can be abused too.   Just yesterday I was watching the TV show Diggers, and one of the fellas on the shows was doing what he called plugging, but the problem was that his "plug" was about a foot square.  That is not what I call plugging.   When you plug, the objective is to take out a whole plug, about the circumference of the target and not much bigger.

Here is a good article on proper recovery techniques.

http://goldpanprospectors.com/files/METAL_DETECTING_RECOVERY_METHOD11.pdf

Another technique taught in that article is "slitting."

It is important to be very careful about how you recover items.   You hear people say that you shouldn't take a knife to a gun fight, well with detecting it is the opposite.  Don't take anything bigger than you absolutely need.   Take a screw driver instead of a shovel.

I'll tell you a secret here.  You don't need a detector to recover an item.   It is not necessary to have a detector with you when you remove an item.  AND, it is not necessary to have a recovery tool with you when you detect.

I don't know if you realize the value of that statement.  I'm sure you didn't hear it before this.   If you get what I am saying, it is worth big bucks.   I'll give you detailed instructions on that some other time.

The one thing I want to leave you with now is this, leave a site looking better than you found it.

And also don't carry around a shovel or anything larger than necessary in a public place such as a park.

Keep a low profile when detecting. 


Today the surf on the Treasure Coast will be up a little, close to four feet.   By Tuesday the predictions are saying that we might get something closer to six feet.  That is getting in close to a surf that could, depending upon other factors, result in improved detecting conditions.   There is a lot of sand that has to be moved though.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net