Here @ Melbourne Beach Fl

Hi all, my wife and I, with friends, made it to Melbourne Beach Wed eve. Taped the speaker and put a shower cap over the 3d's control head and hit low tide this morning. Low tide was 10:40 am if I remember. I tried the perpendicular approach up and down the slope. It works just like Tom said. Up on the high side were pennies, little lower, quarters and along the waters edge at the bottom of the slope I found fishing weights. Amazing! all in a line parallel to the water. I could see many troughs but I didn't want to risk getting into them with the 3d. I didn't find any of the Queens treasure or any jewerly but I had fun seeing the pattern work.
I went to the museum at Sebastian Inlet where they have on display many artifacts, coins, gold and remnants from the dozen or so ships that recked in the 1700's.....loved it. I was told that the museum building is at the spot where the survivors camped after their ships wrecked. The older women at the museum said to stay 1000 feet away if I'm going to detect the area near the museum. I am going to get down there to detect before vacation is over. It's HOT!!! down here, but it's a beautiful area. There is no one on this beach, maybe a dozen as far as I can see. The beach is also clean....no trash, only found one square tab. Well its beer thirty, talk later.

Why the 1000ft buffer zone. Unless the building sits on a designated/registered archeological area or has local/state restrictions, I think its bull. I would ask her what regulation covers the 1000ft buffer, and then research it on the Net. Usually government enforced 'no detect' archeological designated areas are larger than a 1000 feet.

Terra, The women work at the museum and it's a historical area. The thousand foot buffer is small as compared to the miles of wrecks on the treasure coast. I'll just abide by the rules and enjoy the area as I am a visitor here.
The museum had a short movie about the area and it stated the Queen's treasure hasn't been found. A fellow named Mel Fisher discovered a carpet of gold coins 40 or 50 years ago and other treasure hunters have been finding treasure ever since. When I was detecting yesterday an ol timer stopped to chat and he said his friend found a conglomerant mass of I guess sand, shells etc. in the surf. the man took it back home and swung his detector over it and it sounded off. He broke open the mass to find silver coins.
The area we are in seems to be private... not the beaches, but access to the beaches. The signs on the small board walk entrances to the beach say 'private entrance for residence and their visitors only' or something close to that.
Low tide today is at 11:45am and the differential is only a little more than 3 feet but I don't have the option to pick and choose. So far I have only found sinkers, lures, one sq tab and some clad... still fun and beats sitting in the sun and doing nothing.

Ozzie & Terra,
Ozzie I agree with you, with all the miles of beach to do I would respect that area and Terra, as a matter of fact as often as our club does go there I have never heard about the 1000 foot zone. Maybe Tom has heard something?? In our hobby unless we know for sure it's always better to play it safe.

Suncoast Wally



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/24/2011 09:29PM by Suncoast Wally.

I agree, play it safe. Your only visiting. However, if I lived down there, I would investigate it. But hey, thats just me I always follow the rules, but I make sure I know what the rules really are.