I hope that all of you in teh warmer regions of the US that are still getting out there score lots of goodies this month!
Keep swingin'!
I first noticed what I'm guessing are deer tracks in the snow in my front yard, it's the only logical answer, and if you do an image search in Google for "Deer Tracks", you find similar ones. They seem to about the size that would indicate a slightly over 3 year old deer, just my opinion.
I went out in my front yard today, and was pleased that the snow really didn't effect the XLT much, and with the coil cover on, it slid across the surface real nice... took a lot of the weight and effort out of the swing. The ground sure was tough, a 2" hole was really all I could muster. It was like chipping concrete. Sadly, besides finding out that apparently I have a grass sprinkler system that rings up a solid +88, I didn't find much... just a few clad coins. There weren't even really trash signals either, so when the ground thaws I'll get back into it.
And lastly, I had a bunch of furry visitors as well, Fox Squirrels. There were 5 running around, and after some careful observation, two were together, and the others were trying to move in on the girl.
So yeah, I was all packed up and ready to leave yesterday afternoon. Got gas and headed west. I left at about noon-thirty EST and trucked it all the way to just outside of St. Louis, MO the first day. I stopped in Lexington, VA, Ashland, KY and Shiloh, IL for gas.
After getting a good 6 hours of sleep at a Holiday Inn Express, and yes, I sooo thought of those commercials, I got back on the road Sunday morning and made it all the way to here in Golden, CO by 9:45p MST. The second day I stopped in Odessa, MO, Salina, KS and Burlington, CO for gas.
No matter how you look at it, I killed that drive. Google Maps says 27 hours, I think I did it at least in 24 not counting my hours of rest. But here are a few pics from the trip that I was able to get, none are that great, but hey. Some things you'll see along the way are snowy roads, which last the ENTIRE trip. Cars spun out on the side of the road, I saw 5. The Kansas City Royals stadium, the KC skyline. The Arch is St. Louis "Gateway to the West," Ft. Riley, and the last two pics are in CO.
The first goal I had set in 2009 was to find at least one lousy silver coin. Just one was all I asked since in 2008 I found zero. Well what luck, I found 18!!! I can attribute it to upgrading to my White's XLT, but a good amount of that silver was found with my Minelab X-Terra 30 early on in the year.
The next goal was to find at least 20 Wheaties. I think I had found maybe 11 or 13 the year before. Again, I blew this one out of the water, scoring 70!!!
Third on the list was to set a new oldest dug coin record for myself. In 2008 I dug a '29 Wheatie, surely in my area where it's common to find 1800s coins and an occasional late 1700s coin I could do better. Well I did, my oldest dug coin was a 1903 Penny from Great Britain. I beat my previous by 26 years and still left pletny of room for improvement.
A gold ring was next on the list. And well, I met this one... kinda. I found a 10K Gold Filled ring. That counts right? I also found a gold plated bracelet. Neither a solid gold item, but I think it should count.
In 2009 I aimed to double my coin intake from 2008. That means I needed to pull in at least 1,132 coins. Doesn't sound like a lot, especially when there are those in the hobby that pull in excess of 10k coins a year. But I did well, totaling 1,217. Hoo-rah!
I also had hoped to double my clad amount in the dollar range too. To do this, I need to get more than $52.66 out of my clad this year, and I did! I finished with $79.33. That puts me at just over $100 for my MD career so far.
That pretty much sums it up. 2009 was a great year to hunt in Virginia Beach and the surrounding areas. I got to get in some hunts with two buddies Hollis and Chad of whom I'd like to wish, along with everyone else a great 2010!!!
Quotes update on refresh :)
