OP
El Graduado
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Back in the 1980s, my wife and I used to take our White's underwater metal detector out on Sundays and scuba for hours in about five feet of water in front of the hotels on Cozumel. We averaged at least one gold ring an hour. 80% were brand new men's wedding rings. We found lots of diamond and other precious stone rings as well, including class rings and military rings, and piles of gold earrings, bracelets, and necklaces. Over the course of a couple of years, we filled up a small chest with jewelry, corroded coins, keys, and assorted metal items that people went swimming with and lost.
Another friend of mine used a Garret detector. We used to have dinner together and show each other our most recent finds, but never told where we found them. One day, I was driving by Sol Caribe's beach (now you can't see it from the road, but you could back then) and I saw him gearing up with his detector. The next day, I went to the bank and bought two bags of 5,000 ten-centavo coins (which cost a total of about $10 USD back then) and took them out to the Sol Caribe beach and spread them evenly across the sandy bottom of the little cove.
The next dinner we had together, my friend showed me hundreds of dime-sized ten-centavo coins he kept finding and said he was going to give up on the site because he was spending all his time digging them up. I never told him it was me, but I believe he reads Scubaboard, so now I guess he knows!
