I received a call yesterday morning from Sara, about some rings that she had lost in the water the day before. She and her family had been at the beach for the day while vacationing from Minnesota. She told me that she lost the rings in the afternoon and when I looked at the tide charts, I could see the tide was still low, but on its way up. I said I could meet her there in 30 minutes, and we arranged to meet.
When I got to the beach, Sara showed me where she believed she lost the rings, and I began my search. I searched for about 30 minutes, when Sara came over and said her husband Tony (who was up on the hill overlooking the beach with their son) told her we needed to move about 50 feet to the South. I continued my search, but the tide was getting too high, and the waves were making it more difficult to search any deeper. I knew the tide was going to be a minus tide this morning at about 6:30 AM, so I told Sara, I would come back for a search at 5:00 AM. She asked if there was any chance of a recovery, and I told her I always have hope.
Well I got up at 4:00 AM and was on the beach at 5:00 AM. There was definitely a lot more sand to search, and I knew that if it was there I had a good chance of getting it. I could not search where Sara’s husband had mentioned because at 5:00 AM in the dark there was a woman playing in the waves right in the exact area, so I chose to begin where Sara had originally shown me. I started, and began to work my way towards the spot of the loss, and when I drew near the woman left, which made it easier to search the area. Once I began in the area, I made a few passes, when I got a loud bang of a sound in my headphones. I dug, dumped the sand, kicked it around, I ran my coil over the sand, heard the bang in the headphones again, kicked that sand again, and then saw the rings, still together. The great help was that they were able to meet me at the beach the day before and show me exactly where the loss occurred. I got excited, put the rings in my pouch, and made my way home. I waited until a couple of hours later to send Sara the message, so she could sleep in and get some rest. I sent a picture of the rings, and she sent a text back of her unbelief and happiness. We met back at the beach about an hour later, and I was able to give Sara, Tony’s token of his love and commitment to their union, given to her 12 years before. They were leaving for home tomorrow, and she had been worried the rings might be lost forever. What a great day!
Sara sent the following explaining what this recovery meant to her:
Hi Steve, thanks again so much for finding my ring! I still can hardly believe it….what a miracle! Praise God!
Today we are leaving sunny CA and I had a remarkable experience while here that I have to share. Last Monday we were at Redondo beach, having a wonderful time running around on the beach and catching waves. About an hour into our beach fun Tyler and I were knee deep in the surf when a big wave caught us and dragged my wedding ring off my finger. It was one of the worst feelings I have ever had in my life. My heart sunk as I told Tyler to go back up to where Dad was and I proceeded to start frantically looking for it, knowing it was like looking for a needle in a haystack especially since we were in the water and it was high tide. I was so scared to tell Tony, but of course I had to. Plus I needed his help to find it. I hugged him and told him what happened and he was so calm. He tracked down a guy with a metal detector who had been scanning the beach for treasures (after all, he had found a spoon earlier while we were there 
😀) and after about 10 minutes of helping us he said the waves were just « too crazy » and gave up. After looking a while longer we left the beach. I felt awful and was trying so hard to keep it together and not break down in front of Tyler. Even though he kept saying « Mom, why did you wear your wedding ring to the beach? ». Good question, buddy. And the irony of it was, I had actually left my ring in the hotel room when we left, but then realizing the housekeeper would be coming in I decided to turn around and get it. Big mistake! I prayed and prayed that somehow I would get my ring back. That night after Tony and Tyler went to sleep I started bawling and checked Craigslist to see if anyone had found a ring. I found an ad for someone named Steve Smith with ringfinders.com and called him the next morning. He was so nice and asked if I could meet him on the beach in a half hour while the tide was relatively low, and I did. He had a military grade metal detector so I knew he meant business. After about an hour and no luck he said he would come back and look at 5:00 the next morning. Again that day I prayed and prayed but was feeling so awful, thinking how could I leave CA in 2 days without my ring, and thinking either it is in the ocean for good or someone found it and pawned it off. Again I tried to keep it together because I didn’t want Tyler to know how much I was hurting and I didn’t want this to be what he mostly remembered from our trip. So Tony and I only talked about it in private. Anyway, the next morning (yesterday) I woke up after a short night of sleep and saw that Steve had not texted and assumed he didn’t find my ring. We went downstairs for breakfast and I tried hard to keep it together, thinking of all the places where my ring could be, likely in the ocean never to be found. We came back up to the room and I saw there was a message on my phone. I could hardly believe it. Steve texted a picture of my ring, captioning it « What a beauty! ». I started crying like a baby. I hugged Tony, then hugged Tyler, then proceeded to jump on the bed (to Tyler’s amusement). What was incredible is the rings are not soldered together, but rather the band slides into the solitaire which wraps around it. So the fact that the ring remained intact is incredible. I met Steve at the beach and got my ring and, even though he doesn’t charge for his services, gave him a reward. It is amazing how God answered my prayers and led me to this wonderful man that found my ring.
If you lose your ring or other metal item of value, call as soon as possible. I will work hard, using the most up to date metal detectors, to help you find what you thought might never be found again. I search, Beverly Hills, Hermosa Beach, Huntington Beach, Long Beach, Los Angeles, Malibu, Manhattan Beach, Newport Beach, Northridge, Pasadena, Rancho Palos Verdes, Redondo Beach, Santa Monica, Seal Beach, Simi Valley, Thousand Oaks, Torrance, Venice Beach, and all parks, yards, gardens, and ponds (to 5 foot depths) in all of Orange County, all of Los Angeles County, and Ventura County.
