A Ditch Full of Lids
- Inka
- Aug 25, 2022
- 4 min read
It is only Thursday and so far its been a great week. Yesterday the Girlfriend and I went on a roadtrip to a national park up North, where we took a riverboat to see a famous waterfall, Mollisfossen. The trip with the boat took 80 minutes both ways. Many spectacular views. We stayed at the waterfall for an hour and it was simply amazing. It is 269 meters tall and you feel the roar from it in your bones. Highly reccommended.
I have also spent some more time up in the mountainside camp I visited in the weekend. I tripped across a ditch there and decided to get sweaty and worn out. I think it is an irrigation ditch the Germans made to lead water away from their shelters, and it had obviously been filled up with rubbish from the camp.
The first few meters of it had very little interesting items in it. A few bakelite light switches and sockets was worth saving as they were in good shape. Later I dug up some wooden tent pegs, a plastic map grid tool, two MP38/40 magazines, a shower head from the camps bathroom I guess, and some MG 34 parts.
Soon more MG bits began to show up, a wrench, ammo belts, feeding blocks and then a belt loader! It looked to be in pretty ok condition and after some digging I think I got all the parts for it. I also found two gasmask canisters. One taller than the other, which was neat coz I only ever found the tall canisters.
That was on Tuesday.
I climbed back up there today to continue searching the ditch. It was a lot warmer weather today. Completely blue sky and +20 Celsius. So the insects got wild when a sweaty human stepped into their territory.
Luckily I had my mosquito netting with me and put it over my head. I could just continue where I had left off the other day and moments in I saw the front of a German helmet!
A super beginning of the dig! Under it was a rifle cleaning kit and some stripper clips full of 7.92 rounds. Then I felt the round domes of two more helmets after having removed a rock! Brushing away some sand from them revealed a third lid on top of them! Holy Cow! I had to double check if I was having the most realistic dream ever, but I was awake. Possibly more awake now having dragged up four helmets in less than ten minutes. All four in very nice shape.
Less than an hour later, between some tent pegs, bottles, ski goggles and food tins, I had dug out six more helmets!! In one of them I saw a name painted. Oh, I can`t wait for winter to come so I have time to clean them all :D
After lunch and a bit of a rest I went back to work. Now I uncovered some losantine boxes, a field torch, a small map tool , a full gasmask canister and a great looking spork, and believe it or not, I felt the rim of another helmet through the tip of my gloves! This one was in exellent condition and with a well preserved decal! Unreal!
Now a pipe was sticking out near the bottom of the ditch. It took a bit of work to clear sand and rocks from it but in the end I could wriggle the pipe loose. Although it wasn`t just a pipe. It was a K98 rifle! Or, parts of it at least. The buttstock had been broken off, bolt gone, and the barrell had a slight bend to it. But I am well happy finding this piece. It ll make an exellent lamp!
I dug on for a little while but I realised it would be hell getting all this stuff back to the car. Its not an easy trek with just the backpack alone, and now I had 11 helmets and lots of other junk. My backpack is roomy and luckily I had a simple WW2 style Red Army backpack with me as well, so I got it all loaded up.
I felt like I was sinking ancle deep into the ground under all the weight, but somehow I was at the car less than an hour later. With weak arms and shaky legs I got the stuff into the car and drank the rest of my water, ate an apple and a banana before I headed home to unpack, shower and prepare dinner for the Girlfriend who was on her way back home from another mountain.
Unless my legs and arms falls off before tomorrow, I might get back up there, or I ll go pick blueberries somewhere. Time will tell.
Have a great day :)
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