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COIN AND RELIC METAL DETECTING
WESTERN AUSTRALIA
Edition 2 June 2011
This edition will talk about:
Playgrounds
Merredin Peak
PLAYGROUNDS
To start the topic I should state I have found there are two main categories of playgrounds and in those there are 3 types of playgrounds. Now to better explain, the categories are simple: school playgrounds and public park/ reserves playgrounds. Within these there are 3 types of playgrounds, most noticeable on school playgrounds, these types are equipment for older kids/adults such as swings, monkey bars or flying foxes as they seem to be replaced by these days and the elaborate climbing frames. The next type is equipment for 5 to 10 year olds; this is
usually a slide with a fort of some sort, lots of smaller height frames to develop coordination and lower hung swings. Then as you would guess the final type is the little kid’s equipment which I finding these days am just a shrunk down version of type 2, but also you will find rocking horses, see saws and lots of poles. Now back in the 1970’s through to the 1990’s playgrounds had timber in them and not steel or aluminum. I still find these exist but due to cancer links with copper logs they are mainly now removed for metal grounds. Sadly these are the best playground to detect as you can crank up the sensitivity on the Garrett Ace 350 to maximum, but with metal playgrounds when close to poles etc. you get false signals so have to lower the sensitivity when under or around equipment to 1 or 2 bars.
Now onto school playgrounds, I find these amazingly clean of pull tabs and bottle tops, a testament to our school system teaching kids to keep them clean. They are good too great for coins as children take pocket money to canteen, eat lunch fast as they want time on the swings and the loose coins fall out when they on the bars, ladders and swings
Public reserve/ park playgrounds I do find bottle tops and other very sharp metal objects in them, which is good that someone is detecting them and saving kids from injuries. Coins are their but nowhere near as many as schools. One exception would be if you find a playground that has an ice-cream van or shop next to playground. I averaging $2 from reserve and park playgrounds and finding between $6 and $10 in school playgrounds.
Amazing is the $2 coin, it’s a very small but heavy coin and seems to have the habit of jumping out of pockets and into sand. I am finding a lot of them.
MERREDIN PEAK RESERVE
From its humble creation in the fires of planet earth around 20 million years ago to the modern day granite rock that towers over Merredin, this rock and its reserve is a great ground/area to go metal detecting. Hunt explored the rock in 1863 and built a well a few kilometers north of it in 1865. Then by the 1890’s as men and wheel barrows headed to the goldfields in Southern Cross, Westonia and Coolgardie they would stop at the rock, a great source of fresh water in our dry climate then when well rested continue on their way. A hotel was built their 120 years ago out of brush and timber, nothing grand but built to supply the other thirst
of men passing through. No mention in any history text has any reference to the brothel tents that where erected at that same time in Southern Cross and Coolgardie to service the men’s other needs, but I suspect where there is alcohol and up to 100 single men staying for a week or two at a time I would suspect they existed here, it was after all common practice back then. By 1896 a dam had been erected and a granite wall built around the rock would collect water and channel it to the dam, this water was needed for the newly created steam railway that had come to down and needed water for the boilers and to wash the locomotives down. The water would be piped the kilometer or so into the railway siding that became the modern day town of Merredin which shifted from its shanty village at the rock to be closer to the railway siding.
Next to the railway dam by the 1920’s a home was built for the manager of the dam to ensure the pumps and dam functioned in order to keep the water moving to the railway. This home was built next to the dam inside the Merredin Reserve. This home is now a bulldozed pile of rubble surrounded by sandalwood trees and slowly being returned to nature.
Then in the history time line of the peak as it’s commonly known in town came World War 2, by 1942 a field hospital was erected in the peak reserve to treat wounded soldiers from Palestine who would after they recouped return to combat in the pacific. The hospital stayed open for just over a year, concrete slabs where made for the buildings which were many from theatres to storerooms to sanitary rooms to kitchens, everything a modern selfsupporting hospital needed was there including a Red Cross recreation building. The 600 patients of the hospital did not do so well, they were housed in tents, 4 men to a tent which in our winter would have been horrible considering the hot tropics they had come from, we get nights below 0 degrees centigrade in winter and winter days are as low as 14 centigrade with a nice cold wind that never seems to end. Summer the extreme heat in the 40 degree centigrade ranch would have been soothed by swimming in the railway dam which is only 200 meters from the hospital site. I have found coins in this area from 1913 to 1961 and my first half penny from 1942 as well. The concrete slabs are still everywhere in the hospital site and even though bush land is slowly encasing them, they are easy to find and if you can tolerate the tin and other trash you will find coins.
Once the soldiers and hospital left the peak it went back to being the playground for the town again, there is some very old cars burned out in there and many old camp grounds that are awaiting still to be found again. I found a campsite that was at least 10 years old as in the fireplace it had a mature shrub growing out of it which was at least 10 years old, around this fireplace I found two coins.
A aboriginal camp also existed built by federal government to house the displaced people who have wandered the rock thousands of years, this camp existed from the 1950’s to 1971 when they moved into homes within the town. From 1971 to now there is no record of people living in the rock reserve and now days even camping are banned in there. It is a very popular walking area, 100 acres of reserve to explore and even gets a tour bus drive around it on a daily basis. Wildflowers bring people in their 100’s or more during August to October. On one side of the rock, the town side, a golf course was built in 1924 that exist to this day. Yes with the Merredin Peak I expect as long as I live 2 minutes’ drive from it I will be detecting there, you can never run out of spots to detect in the reserve.
A video of the peak, a large slideshow with many more pictures of the peak reserve on it http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_profilepage&v=hf d0wExhe-I
Once again thank you for reading my little piece of local metal detecting, I still have a wealth more of photos and stories to share from the last 5 weeks, so stay tuned for next installment and please subscribe to my YouTube channel where is videos of playgrounds and Merredin peak on it http://www.youtube.com/user/jacktreasurehunter