A German tourist has had a dream result in what could have been a holiday nightmare.
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Merten Foerster and his family were enjoying a day out at Bunker Bay when Mr Foerster felt his custom-made platinum wedding band slip from his finger while playing in the surf with his daughter.
“I was mortified – it is not cheapest thing to lose and also it is a wedding ring,” he said.
“I tried to find it, I went back the next day and I was devastated, the whole beach looked completely different overnight.
“I said to my wife ‘maybe I should go again’, and she said ‘forget about it, you would need a metal detector’, then I found people actually do it.”
Mr Foerster came across The Ring Finders, a metal detecting service, and was put in touch with Sean Boddie.
Mr Boddie said it was a tough recovery, given three days had passed by the time he travelled to the South West.
“I garnered the details from him I checked the weather and tide conditions for the area,” he said.
“Time is of the essence with all searches, but particularly in the surf for a number of reasons. The biggest of those is that when the sand a ring is sitting in becomes liquidated by the surf, most of the resistance which is supporting the weight of the lost item is removed, and the ring or other heavy object settles lower and lower until something stops it or the resistance increases.”
Luckily, Mr Foerster was able to provide detailed reference points of the area where he lost his precious ring.
That teamed with Mr Boddie’s methodically planning and search, resulted in the recovery.
“As I approached the waters edge at the spot Merten had marked on the map I finally heard another signal,” he said.
“I then felt for the item and yelled a big woohoo when I felt the unmistakeable shape of a ring in my hand.”
Mr Foerster said it was amazing, and the find had turned his 2018 around.
“It really is fantastic, I mean I could have got another ring but it would always be the second and not the original,” he said.
“I thought maybe it would come back, many years in the future if I child stumbled across it but it was already 20cm deep so it probably wouldn’t have been found.
“At first I didn’t think it would be a very good year, now I feel the opposite and think everything will go alright.”
Mr Boddie said he loved reuniting people with their treasured items.
“Every ring has a story attached to it and when it's lost the story ends,” he said.
“I give people a second chance to find it and continue that story.”
