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scottwyl
Monte, I have been in some of the same climate as you. I was born and raised in Corvallis, Oregon, and can remember going months without seeing sunshine.

Ugly cloudy days, some with fog, some with rain, some with a lot of rain ... almost endless rain at times. Corvallis is a little better than Portland, but not by much.

Here's a quick comparison of Oregon locations where we were and where we are:

Rain Per Year:
Corvallis .... 43"
Portland .... 44"
Hermiston ... 9"
Vale ...........11"


Sunny Days Per Year:
Corvallis ..... 159
Portland ...... 144
Hermiston ... 189
Vale ............ 209

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scottwyl
I too have lived in Arlington. That river park does see some visitors. The current craze of wind surfing draws more than a few people. I have not been there for probably 10 years, come to think of it. It may not be the way I remember.

The inlet beach at Arlington does draw a fair number of seasonal park goers who play in the water, but not with much to lose. The two years I lived there, 9/'13 to 10/'15, I worked that beach and park quite a bit and the beach was pretty spotty to lean.

Yes, the 'wind surfing' crowd does draw a lot of beach activity and the more popular beaches can be productive during peak season, or actually right after when they are not packed with a lot of wind enthusiasts. Arlington does get more than enough wind, to be sure, but the better wind surfing beaches are at Hood River and a few other popular places up to Rufus along the Columbia where they have more open beach area and places to camp, park, and play. I did live in Hood River from 3/'99 to 3/'01 and the mineralized rocky/sandy beaches provided me a lot of easy access when I had time to hunt and nowhere else to go.

However, a lot of windsurfers seem to fit the category we used to use to refer to a 'beach bum' down in California and elsewhere. They had a lot of fun playing, but didn't seem to work very much or carry (and lose) a lot of change or jewelry.

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scottwyl
I'm not under any illusion of supporting myself by detecting. I suppose there are a few who can, but I'm not one!

It's an exciting Hobby, to be sure, but trying to work at it to support ourselves hasn't been possible since the latter '70s. When I got out of the service forty-eight years ago this month and moved to Portland in '71, I was finding coins-a-plenty in parks and schools and other public activity sites, just like I had since the summer of '68.

In '71 the minimum wage was $1.97 an hour, making it less than $80 a week at a full-time 40 hour job and I shouldn't have gone to work. At the time I was still able to put in day-long detecting with a trusted TR or TR-Disc. model and armed with a rounded-off screwdriver for the majority of the coin recoveries, I could fill a pint jar to a quart jar of coins in a day. But those would have been longer hours of 'work' (if we call it that), and the problem was where I lived. Referring to the climate report above, Portland had a lot of wet and dreary days when I wouldn't be out hunting.

In that 10-year period from '68 to '78 I was recovering 60K to 70K coins per year when I was working extra time with two jobs. Without the extra-time or over-time I could peak at the 120K to 130K average a year. I often wonder how I would have done if I wasn't just detecting before and after 'regular' work and days off and was committed to making Metal Detecting my 'job' from dawn to dusk five or six days a week.

The following ten years, through '88, were still very good, but you could notice the diminishing recoveries from popularly hunted sites as the years passed by. Still 'fun' to be had, and a lot of older coins and silver coins still available, but those bounteous earlier years were a time when you could work hard at having 'fun' and still make a living. of course to make it a "high paying" job location was the key and you had to live in and 'work' in and around a major metropolitan city where a lot of people had lived for a long, long time and there were many "work sites" you could draw from.

Seattle and surrounding major cities, Portland Oregon and the bigger populated areas in the valley. The Ogden to Salt Lake City area in Utah, Denver Colorado, and many, many places in California, and state-by-state there were key locations of high productivity. Arlington, Hermiston and Vale were not in the 'big money' category, but did offer a lot more than they do today. We still want to or would like to find a lot, but we're really benefitting more fro just having 'FUN' these days.

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scottwyl
I don't know much about the shows on tv, as I have never watched any, but I assume the production company pays high dollar for hunting privileges, and I would also guess all finds are retained by the property owner. The showmen's 'gold' is in viewership and advertising, I would imagine.

I don't care to watch much of what has been on the televised programs as it is more of a corporate thing and doesn't reflect a lot of reality as we know it. They always make it look far more rewarding, in a short period of time, than what it actually is.

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scottwyl
Times do change. There are less youngsters losing fewer coins. Gold and silver jewelry is giving way to titanium and stainless steel. More modern trash masking the dwindling good finds that were somehow missed. I do like to daydream about escaping the rut I have been the past 40 years, though.

Yes, times have changed and I don't see them getting any better, either, with so much activity tied in with TV's, Videos and other electronic media distraction, and far less interest in folks, of all ages, getting out and enjoying life as we once knew it .... outdoors.

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scottwyl
Multi-Kruzer-7" coil, Racer 2 -7" and 5" coils, XL Pro, Classic IDX

You're listing a nice foursome of detectors to own. Makes a good outfit of general purpose detectors.

Monte

"Your EYES ... the only 100% accurate form of Discrimination!"
Stinkwater Wells
Trading Post
Metal Detector Evaluations and Product Reviews
'How-To' help for Coin & Jewelry Hunting, Relic Hunting and Useful Techniques.
'Regular-Use Detector Team' are models from: Fisher, Nokta / Makro, Teknetics, Tesoro and White's
'Specialty-Use Detectors' are models from: Compass, Garrett and Teknetics
Pinpointers: Using Nokta / Makro and Uniprobe Pointers.
Headphones: Using Killer B's 'Hornet' and White's Pro Star and Detector Pro's Uniprobe ... All w/'tank style' ear cups.
Recovery Gear: Using White's DigMaster digging tool and Signature Series pouch.Note: Detectors are listed alphabetically by Brand. Models are chosen as desired based on search site conditions.
Some models are assigned for 'Regular-Use' and others are on-hand for 'Specialty Use.'
Additional search coils, mounted on spare lower-rods, are on-hand in my Accessory Coil Tote.

*** All working well today to make memories for tomorrow. ***
monte@stinkwaterwells.com .. or .. monte@ahrps.org
(503) 481-8147