This weekend I searched on an interesting piece of land. It is a bit high up in the terrain where the Germans constructed a small camp complex with soldiers, pioneers and Org.Todt, plus Red Army POWs and their guards. The engineers and the POWs were to work on positions and other installations in the area. It was a bit of a walk up there but with some stops for breathing and for eating blueberries I made it up there alive. The weather was a bit sketchy though. It couldn`t really decide if it was going to be nice or nasty. There were some ruins of stone built shelters here and there, and I had seen several earthen dug outs. One or two rusted stoves tipped over on the forest floor had also been observed on the way up.
I got the detector turned on and within a minute it gave a good strong signal from a piece of brass. It was a field made luggage tag that had belonged to Prinz Fritz. His unit was also stamped into the tag,: 3. Gebirgs Artillerie Regiment 118. Thats the nicest luggage tag I have ever found, so I was very happy.
The next good thing I found was a full gas mask canister, and then a few coins from Finland. One signal I struggled a bit with locating, and when I did find it I was about to just chuck it away as it was just a piece of wire. But when I lift it up from between the small branches on top of the moss I see that it is not just a wire. If this really is what I believe it to be it is the darkest and most sinister thing I have ever found. One end of the wire had been bent and curled into a strong knot around a triangular ring from some equipment, so that one of its corners stood out. The other end of it was looped up into a handle. The whole thing was 30 cm long. Definitely made for hitting something. Or someone. Having studied the history about the POWs, I have read in litterature and biographies, more than once, about guards and Kapos who armed themselves with batons, or torture instruments like this thing I had just found. I ve seen it referred to as "Der Knüppel".  
​ Under some rocks I find a small dumping pit. And it is full of good stuff! A few minutes into digging I see the contours of a helmet! Wow, must be helmet number seven or eight this season! It is in good condition and has the leather liner inside. The next minutes two gasmask canisters show their rust colors from under the sand. One full and the other was empty. But I find the gasmask a bit deeper into the dumping pit. I dig out some civillian porcelain and glassware, which I of course also really enjoy finding. Some of those old things have great designs. Im digging rather fast but when I spot a big fishing hook I slow all the way down. Don`t wanna one of those attached through the gloves and fingers kilometers from the car. It is nice and sharp and soon after I find a whole packet of hooks, still in the paper wrapping. Between loose hooks is a Red Army soldiers spoon, with name and initials engraved. I am still digging slowly when I feel the steel on the sole of a Gebirgsjäger boot. It is a pair of them, both is displayable condition so I place them safely to the side with the other relics. I have rescued maybe twenty gaming pieces when I see the rim of a helmet in front of the bayonet blade Im scraping sand with. This one also in good condition and with the liner intact. And under it is a third helmet!! OMG! Am I having a full ditch of helmets again?
​ As I was digging on, I was already making plans how to transport 120 lids down through the forest. I didn`t get any need for those plans though, coz soon the pit was empty. Almost empty. As a small bonus, or actually a great find, was a Edelweiss badge laying under the moss on the edge of the pit. "Awesome!" was all I could think about that find :D I double checked around the pit before I filled it back in and tidied up the place.
I was going to search some more but the clouds finally burst open and made it pretty unpleasant. Soon thunder could be heard as well and I guess being up in the height with a backpack full of metal and electronics can be a bit stupid :D
I hope I ll make a new trip there soon, and I wish you all a good week :)

Edelweiss!! :)

I spent the whole day in the forest today. Early morning the Girlfriend dropped me off before going on her own expedition. Having wised up a little bit from my previous trips I didn`t turn on the detector before I got close to the barracks I have wanted to search around. It is a bit of a climb up a steep hill up to the plateau with the barracks. In the bottom of it, just by the base of a tree the detector gave a great signal. I removed the moss and saw that I would need the rootcutter and the saw more than the digger tool, my trusted old bayonet. It took a little bit of swearing and sweating but then I freed a German shaving cup from the grip of the roots. These often have names and art engraved on them so I wiped it off with the back of my glove. "1944" and and anchor with the Soviet star had been engraved on one side of the cup. The other side had a heart with a knife through it, and a gun pointing to the heart, inside it a bottle and a glass. Quite the symbolism. Between the motives is a name with cyrillic letters engraved. 
I checked between the roots with the pin pointer and it told me to keep digging. A little cutting, sawing, hacking and scooping out sand later I lifted out a enamel water pitcher. Pin pointer said to continue so I did. After a while I reached metal again. This time I looked at the bottom of a mess kit, and I could just pull it out of the sand. This one too had engravings. Its motive was a house, and on the bottom a name written with cyrillic letters, prehaps of the place. It wasn`t empty under the tree yet. I scooped out a large rotted battery, some food tins and then I pulled out a bayonet! What a start! I was warm and sweaty and became even more so when I reached the top of the hill. On the way up I found a couple of heer axe heads, a razor and some coins and buttons.
​Finally I was by the remains of the barracks and after a rest I began searching and soon found a small dumping pit. 
A lot of charcoal, ashes and melted blobs showed that this pit had been set on fire, but a few very nice items had survived. The first one was quite interesting. I didn`t realize what it was at first but after a while it dawned on me. It was a four pointed star cut from metal, with a hole drilled where a strong wire was attached. The other end of the short wire was coiled so that it could fit around the top of a tree. A christmas star of course! From a celebration in the barrack. Or at least I hope it is :D I found a burnt out M24 grenade head, and then I uncovered a metal dome. Hm, dared I hope? The shape looked more and more like helmet as I dug it loose, and soon there was no doubt. It looked to be in good condition, I could even see traces of a decal beneath the mud and rust! Under it was a broken binocular case made from bakelite. In the centre of the pit it was nothing  worth saving, but to the sides of it things were still intact. Lots of food tins, a few coins, a shotglass made of amber colored glass, three rifle cleaning kits and then I saw it. Another one! I had removed some moss and the rim of a helmet stuck out from the ground. This one had seen more flames than the first one, but the metal was still strong so it`ll probably be worth giving it the old oxalic acid bath treatment.
I got up on my feet and searched around the bonfire. In a small patch were several aluminum signals. I opened up the first one and had a EKM between my fingers! From a Gebirgsjäger unit! Fantastic. I could almost not have dreamt of a better find. It was in beautiful condition. The marking on it: St. I / G.JE.R.138 bloodtype 0 and rollnumber 152. Of course now I imagined the other signals around it could be a whole bunch of such tags, but they were all food tins.
The hours went by and I strolled around checking signals and enjoying the day. I found some of the usual bits before I had a little luck again. Under a blueberry bush was a beautiful Eastern Front medal, the Ostmedaille. I had been roaming around for hours and it was time to head back down to the road and find the pick up point.
The Girlfriend arrived at the same time as I nearly fell out of the forest, wet, with a muddy face and with a heavy backpack. She had also had a successfull trip, and had picked lots of huge blueberries and mushrooms on her way. She had found blueberry paradise so one of the days we`ll bring some bin bags and fill them with goodies.
Now it is weekend and time for some relaxing, or, maybe I should (shouldn`t I ?)  go for some searching :D

Have a nice weekend :)
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Busy days and nasty weather has kept me mostly at home, but for some hours early in the week I was searching and digging. I had planned to walk to a site where it is ruins of a few Wehrmacht barracks. That plan fell apart some sixty meters from where I parked. Between some birch trees I saw the traces of an old filled in ditch, a food tin was sticking out of the ground and when scratching the surface a bit with the bayonet, broken glass came to show so there was little else to do than to check it for treasures.
It began good with a German mess kit under the first layer of moss and roots. It had the color intact and the initials of the owner engraved. Then I found a few barbed wire poles, but an interesting type I`ve never seen before. It looks like they are meant to be stuck into trees. Those I could not leave behind, I`ll find use for them in the garden. After removing more rocks from the top it became sandy with very little roots and nice to dig. A red lacquered late war canteen piled up on the side together with lots of the usual bits and pieces. A fishing reel stuck out as an interesting item so did a rubber pad from an RSO track link. I pryed loose a stone from the side of the ditch and together with it flew a Lapplandfront Cross!! I saw it like in slow motion as it spun through the air and landed in the sand. It was green-blue from being burnt in the fire that had been in the ditch. All the beautiful blue enamel were gone and the center of it was missing. Luckily I carried a sift. Like gold panners are using. I spent the next three or four hours going through the rest of the ditch , sifting everything. 
The missing piece of the badge was not found. It is very possible that it had popped of and melted in the fire. That I missed it and it is still there is also a possibility. Maybe sometime in the future I`ll re-sift it all if I get desperate enough :D
While sifting I spotted gold, or at least something looking like gold, maybe tombac. A very nice thin "gold" ring had been lost or thrown into the ditch. I like such finds. I imagine the owner had become skinnier during the retreat from Finland and it simply slipped off from his finger while he was throwing stuff into the ditch.
My back and legs needed a stretch, so finally I tried getting to the barracks. I almost got there. Halfway there I found a spot with lots of signals and had to check them of course. These were rifle casings and stripper clips, but in between them was a little gem. It was half of a EKM ("dog-tag"), but when I turned it around it appeared to be a complete tag, just folded over. Very carefully I tried unfolding it just enough to see what was on it, but it snapped. Still, I was super happy finding a tag. It was from Landesschützen Bataillone 809. A unit mostly made up of older soldiers and soldiers not completely fit for frontline duty, and was used to guard depots, POW camps, installations etc. 
I decided to end the day on this high note, and strolled happily back to the car, eating some berries on the way. I really need to take the Girlfriend out for a berry-picking day soon.
​Tomorrow I am making another attempt on the barracks.
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Judging by the temperature, rain, fallen leaves and the abundance of berries and mushrooms in the forest one can say that autumn is here. I had hoped that summer would last another 5 or 6 months. Now it looks like I need to find rain clothes and woolen underwear and gear up the searching a notch so I can gather enough rust for the winter. And berries. Need to pick a few kilos of those. The blue ones. They are the best. It goes without saying that the rust is most important of course. So I spent yesterday searching in the Gebirgsjäger camp. 
 The forest was wet and it felt cold kneeling down to pin point a signal. The Fisher had shown me a patch full of metal and I had been taking away nails and a couple of cream tubes from it and was hunting for the last item hiding itself in the black soil. Its round shape finally gave it away and I could pick up a button. A crowned eagle. Polish. Hm, how did that end up here, must have been some Polish POWs together with the Gebirgsjägers.. I thought. I began walking down the slope towards the marshy area where I found all the leather bits a couple of weeks ago. I dreamt about finding great things there. But I needed to get there first, and I didn`t move fast since I had to check signals along the way. Now I found another small area with lots of signals. It almost looked like someone had been emptying a backpack or a crate. Under the moss were a broken porcelain plate, a k98 cleaning kit, some buttons, two pocket knives, gaming pieces,perfume bottles and cream tubes. In the very edge of the spill, stuck under a root I found a Wound Badge! It was missing the needle and was made of steel, but still, awesome to find.
By the marshy place, which I actually think is more of an overgrown old pond than a marsh, I threw the backpack under a tree and went to check the place with my detector. I found bits from gebirgsjäger boots and several leather frogs for the k98 bayonet scabbard and a few ammo pouches. Some weaker steel signals caught my attention and I got a bit of a dip in the water when trying to reach the metal. It was fresh, but I could feel the shape of a helmet so it was worth the soaking. The lid I pulled up to the surface was black from all the years in the silt under water. It had three small holes in the dome and lacked the leather liner but looked to be in nice condition. That was such a cool find! I stuck my arm back into the water and felt around. Sure enough I had another one! This time it was only half of a helmet, the rest had rusted away. The next ten minutes I found fragments of four more helmets. I kept searching and found a canteen, Soviet or Finnish, and some shoes.
 I was drenched. Not a dry spot on me, and the backpack was getting full. I wandered slowly towards the car, checking signals and eating berries. I found and dug a small dumping pit that had some food tins, signal flares, trench candles, spoon, knife, cream tubes and a k98 dummy rifle casing. No coins or more medals though, prehaps they will be found on the next trip :)
Have a nice weekend :)

The weekend opened with heavy rain, thunder and lightning. It took about an hour for the weather to roll over us and before the sun broke through the clouds I was already dirty and muddy. I continued searching through the ditch I ve been digging lately. Food cans and rocks was on the menu, but then I broke loose a rusted can from the wall of the ditch and it was heavy, and it rattled when I shook it. Exciting! Very surprised it was not rusted solid I just twisted the lid off. The insides looked brand new. It was full of small bolts and nuts, and tiny metal parts all covered in greasy water. 
I dug up two barrel bands and then found the bottom part of the barrel was still intact, although the wood was rotted and soft. I got it out of the way , checked the bottom of the ditch and like a mole continued forward. Now I struck another barrel. But this one looked like it was intact. It took close to two hours to free it from the ground. It was laying upside down and there was a chance something was inside it. Wrapped around it was a rubber tube I really wondered what could be. I had to dig all around the barrel to get it loose. A complete fuel hose with nozzle and hand pump. The type that was stuck into the Kraftstoff barrels. I could still smell fuel from it. In the process of getting it out of the ground I also found a very interesting lamp made in USA. A "Lorraine Controllable Driving light", in pretty nice condition too. The only thing inside the barrel was a zink bucket. 
Not even 45 cm further I struck another barrel. This too took a few hours to get around. It was also empty. But next to it there was a "Verbandkasten", a Red Cross medic kit box (it was empty) and a massive piece of metal that I think might be the trailer hitch part from a field kitchen. In the side of the ditch was a small piece of thin wood that made me wish I had a time machine. It had been a wooden sign, probably for a lazarett, and only the red cross symbol had survived. It was so thin and delicate that I`m not sure I ll be able to save it. 
I was tired by now and when I found a metal barrel blocking the ditch ahead I packed up my toys and took the rest of the day off.
 
I spent the next sunny day, and then the following rainy one at home, before Monday appeared with perfect weather and me continuing in the ditch.

I took the detector and checked the ditch a couple of meters in front of the metal barrel. I got a signal, not a great one and of course the signal from the big barrel interfered, but I had to check all of the ditch anyway. Under the top layers was wire. Lots of it. A sane person would probably just leave it and look for another signal to dig on, but I spent a lot of time and energy trying to get the stuff away. It was stuck everywhere, and pulling on it only resulted in that the thin steel wires found flesh. Luckily the Girlfriend had gifted me a great multitool to have in my kit and the wirecutter on that one saved the day. `Snip-snip-snip` and the large bundle of electrical wire was out of the way, and it had drawn blood only from five fingers.
Now things began to pour out of the ditch. Some brackets probably for vehicles, a Solex carburetor, a little cloth, an inkpot and then a Notek lamp! And another Notek! What?? I was so surprised. Both in quite good condition.  Work got slowed down again by two large tire chains and I needed a bit of a rest after fighting those to the surface.
Under the chains was a large coal bucket and a Notek for the rear of the vehicle!! Wow, a real Notek-day today apparently! As I am getting closer to the metal barrel I am slowed down yet again by another bundle of wires. These are 1 cm thick so there is no cutting through them. In the end I somehow got the wires out of the way and found several more Noteks along the way! Also a complete bunker stove in great shape! I had built a pile of smaller items as well, here was an ashtray, some bakelite connectors, an enamelled soup bowl,  foldable steps for the field kitchen, two coal scoops, several small bottles, the bakelite cup from a thermos, frying pan, porcelain plate, a pair of goggles and 1/4th of a car tire plus some tools and other parts.

I was only 5 hours into the digging but I had no more room for even the tiniest of relics in my backpack, and I would need some energy getting this haul back to the car, so when I reached the metal barrel I called it quits. I was super happy finding no less than seven Noteks; three front lights and four rear ones, plus two smaller oval rear lights. A real lamp day. It ll be a few days until my next digging, but I hope to have this whole ditch done by weekend :)

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It is August already. Luckily this month still counts as summer, which the weather-departement seems to have gotten a notification about coz they delivered today. Blue sky and sun, and temperature around +20 Celsius. Usually I would spend such a day around the house and relaxing in the hammock, but I was in need of a bit of digging. Around 10 o`clock I was on place in the Gebirgsjäger camp, ready to score a little rust. I chose a patch of open ground as my starting point so I could detect and at the same time let the sun fill up my vitamin D reservoirs. I am glad I did, because after digging up the first few rifle casings and nails I found a nice little Reichspfennig coin. A mixture of signals from the Fisher F5 led me to a small dumping pit where the good finds were a German mess kit, a food tin and a bottle. What could have been a nice find too was a M24 grenade head, but it disintegrated when I pulled it out from the ground. I searched around the foundations of a small building and found maybe all the nails they had used when setting it up, but a few meter from where the entrance had been I dug up a small fishing lure, possibly more modern.  Searching in the sun gets too hot, so I went into the forest again and walked to a pre-discovered ditch. I have known about this ditch for a couple of years but now it was apparently time to open it up. But first I needed water, lots of water, and food :)

The ditch is actually a row of three ditches. Each 4-5 meter long, with a fair amount of varied signals in all of them. Of course I began digging in the end of the ditch that had rusted food cans. Boring and annoying to dig, but maybe something could be under them all. Forty minutes later I knew. It was nothing under them. I continued down the ditch and even if the food cans were present, other relics had been thrown into the mix. There were also more rocks and roots so digging was not so easy as with the cans. Parts from wagons or vehicles, cream tubes and bottles piled up on the side. I saw a needle, like the one a doctor would use. And I knew I had to be extra careful now. Some years ago I dug in a pit in a field hospital, and struck an ore of those needles and one of them stuck itself under my finger nail. Not extremely pleasant. I found some rusted metal flakes near the eight needles so I hoped that was from the box they had been in. A little funny find was the tube of Wehrmacht mosquito repellent. I should test if it is still effective. Next I wrestled out a large piece of rubber that had been like a trousers,boots and suspenders in one. But it was all rotted and destroyed. Tucked into it though was a Notek lamp bracket that had been preserved perfectly.
I removed more rocks and soil and felt the corner of a box. As I scraped away the soil around the item, wooden bits came of it. It was a wooden box that fell apart, but it had a metal box inside! It was neatly placed on a couple of rocks in the bottom of the ditch. Not thrown in like all the other stuff. So I became very intrigued.
​ I lifted the lid and looked into a painters kit. The lid was actually the paint palette. Brushes, a scissor, lots of oil paint tubes and a box with water paints were in it! What a cool find!! 

Using the cutter on roots and the bayonet to pry loose more rocks before scooping out soil I advanced into the ditch. I found a field torch, and what I first thought was a helmet or a lamp turned out to be a perfectly preserved enamelled bedpan! I dug out several wrenches, files and tools, some mystery parts, a vehicles rear light, a small engine and a ceramic part with a logo, I think it reads "Steyr". Almost on the bottom there were two bakelite items. A canteen drinking cup, and a karbid box for the Einheitslanterne. I check again with the pinpointer and with the help of the bayonet I uncover a real nice air pressure gauge with German text.  I scraped a bit more with the blade and used the pinpointer. No signals. I got up on my feet and checked with the Fisher. It was silent the next half meter or so in the ditch, before it was full of signals again. A perfect place to end the digging for today.
​I think I will be continuing here soon..

It was time for this seasons last searching together with Baard. His vacation is coming to an end and he has to get back to reality soon. We continued searching for old war relics from early morning yesterday. A friend of Baard has a garage where it was a Wehrmacht storage, next to the Gebirgsjäger camp and thats where we began. The place looked promising with several ditches and partly filled holes spread out through the forest. The first signal I got was iron and resulted in a large timber axe. The biggest I ve seen actually. It was next to the remains of a dug-out and inside there was a lot of good signals. The luck would have it to be nothing but wires and a piece of chain. Most of the ditches and holes was empty, or had some rations foil or practise ammo from more recent Nato and army excersises. Baard found a small ditch with relics from the wartime, but it was nothing much in it only a few nice bottles and several ski bindings, and in a small pit I found part of a ski pole and the spoon part from a Göffel. We figured this was not much to shout Hurrahs for, and decided to move into the next forest where we have been doing all our searching lately with somewhat better results.
We strolled the ca half kilometer through the woods while we swung the metal detectors in front of us. I walked closest to the road and picked up signal after signal, but it was all junk that idiots had thrown out of their car windows.
​ When we found the first of several barrack foundations we threw down the backpacks and did a quick sweep around the foundations before it was time for coffee. The summer had returned and it became a bit boiling in the open so soon I was back on my legs and went into the shade under the trees. Here I found a harmonica, some k98 casings and more rubbish from passing cars. 
When we met at the backpacks for lunch a bit later Baard had dug up a nice Norwegian coin. A bit bent and from 1952 but a pretty neat find. I had found a wet marshy ditch where I picked up a uniform button, a cavalry stirrup, a strange looking horseshoe tool (at least thats what I think it is), food tins and a small glass jar. We were sitting next to a large stinging nettle patch and Baard the lunatic just wandered into it checking for signals. He proved there was metals under the soil there but to what cost? We dug a bit from the sides of the patch as one probably would get stung to death sitting down in the middle of the bushes. From the soil came a half rotten Gebirgsjäger boot, a pair of spurrs, a padlock and two lanterns for candles. It was a pain digging there though as the nettles kept stinging and when putting the shovel in the ground some of them would fall over and whip their stingers across face and hands. Not terribly comfortable, so we moved on into the camp area and made plans to chop down the nettles before our next attempt there.
​The rest of the day we dug up some gaming pieces, M24 grenade parts, stripper clips and rifle casings, a field shovel, some cream tubes, a wallet and a silver spoon. Also a small chewing tobacco tin with a name engraved, a large wrench and more of the mine parts we found last time. 
The day had passed way too fast and we could agree that it had been a very nice trip out in the nature even if none of us felt we had gotten any really good finds. It ll be a year until next time Baard will be back in the North, but I am hoping to get a trip out again one of the next days. So until then, Keep Smiling :)

Just after 09 on Sunday morning me and Baard continued searching the remains of the gebirgsjäger camp. We were digging some signals when a loud explosion ripped through the silent forest, followed by the sound of a vehicle putting its breaks on and the clanking of a ruptured wheel. It was a trailer on the nearby road that had lost one of its wheels. Luckily it all went well with no accident happening. We continued to pull rusted items out of the ground but it was from a burn pit so most of the metal was in very bad condition, and glass and alloys came to the surface as melted blobs. Now I discovered that my pinpointer didn`t work any longer. I could turn it on and off, but it wouldn`t detect any metals. I sat down and had a closer look at the old tool. A small hole had developed and water had gotten into the electronics. How frustrating! I immediately found my phone, went online and ordered a new pin pointer. The searching went a bit slower after this as it took some extra time to locate items the detector picked up signals from. Luckily Baard hadn`t lost his pin pointer yet so now and then I had to borrow his machine. 
In front of the barrack my Fisher showed me a great signal and I began digging around it. It lay quite deep and for the longest time I was sure I had found a British helmet, but the promising looking rim was just part of some kind of bowl. Underneath the bowl was a few bottles. One small ether bottle with the liquid still inside, and a bigger bottle with some nasty looking yellow stuff inside. 
Next to one of the barracks I spent half an hour digging up a large metal plate and under it was a small metal tin with the paper label still intact, and a few M24 screw corks and ignitor cord pull balls. Baard was busy digging up some other metal fittings for the stickgrenades but we didn`t find any of the heads, or any intact wooden sticks. But I am sure they are somewhere in the area. Leaning against the barrack foundation stood several wooden wheels for carriages and some sleds rotting away in the undergrowth. We could see parts of ovens and rotting wooden crates. Also a large boiler from a kitchen was tipped over next to the ruin. It is such an interesting site to search! Next to the boiler I found half the instruction plate to the kitchen and a nice field made ashtray.
The hours flew by and the piles of scraps and finds grew steadily. I found some k98 ammo here and there, and a not so good signal turned out to be a great little find, a close combat knife where parts of its wooden grip had survived. Baard found a couple of sheet metal fittings that we saw had to be from mines. It looked like the construction used on wooden Schuminen, but it was larger. A little bit later while digging next to a ditch we found piles of these parts under the long grass growing there. I didn`t count how many but it had to be 30-40 pieces. After some research and posting them online we figured out they were German copies of Norwegian mines, named Befehls Schützen Mine M43 (n) ( Beh.Sch.m.M43 (n) ). 
It was a day where we mostly found scrap and rubbish, but still a great day, and as our energy ran out the evening was upon us nearly 11 hours after we began. The weather had been perfect all day long. Nice temps and almost no bugs and just a few drops of rain.
We had planned to continue the search the next day but rain ruined that plan so hopefully we ll get another chance around the weekend if the stars align perfectly.
Until then, keep enjoying the summer as best you can :)

I guess some of you read the title and eagerly clicked the link, but no, it is not the `Blue Öyster Bar` kind of leather this will be about, I am reffering to some old leather from military equipment I found yesterday. Me and the Girlfriend went out to the woods to forage some plants and to hunt for relics. These days we are collecting Fireweed. We will make syrup from the flowers, and later we ll harvest leaves from the plant to make tea. Tasty and pure goodies from the nature. While Girlfriend filled two bags with flowers I went up and down the slope with my metal detector and dug up a bunch of rubbish and rifle casings. The only good find I had was the lid from a Wehrmacht soup container. A couple of hours passed and Girlfriend left to trek up a mountain to check on one of her insect traps so I moved along and into an area where it was a few remains of barracks. Here I found a German messkit which looks like the owner engraved his initials on, a bed pan, sadly it was rusted through and a lid for a tea pot. Then I dug up a small enamelled soup ladle, the type that fits into the lid of the soup containers. A very nice little find!
I walked into a small open patch in the birch forest and there was a lonely signal waiting to be found. When I saw the square piece of metal that was one half of a Stalag tag (POW ID tag) I was really happy! Like I mentioned in my last report, I haven`t found any stamped tags for years but this week it is raining apparently. I placed the tag safely in my pocket and went over the moss with the pinpointer. 5 cm away it goes "BeepBeep". There was the other half of the tag!! The day couldn`t be any better. Or so I thought.
I found a dumping pit and spent an hour digging it but it was all broken glass and metal bits that once was something, and then I walked around for an hour not finding much. I began my journey back to the car and strolled into a bit of a marshy area. Here the detector picked up an interesting signal. I was dry but I couldn`t pass on this one. With the pinpointer in hand I submerged my arm into the cold dark amber colored liquid. Elbow deep. I could feel the pinpointer touch something so I placed it on dry land and stuck my arm back into the water and felt around. I grabbed hold and pulled out two leather frogs for the K98 bayonet! The next handful was two k98 ammo pouches! This went on for the next half hour- forty minutes. I had a whole pile of the stuff next to me. I had pulled out a piece of cloth too which was the rests of a jacket, but the only salvageable from it was some buttons. It was a pretty exciting session. I did another sweep with the detector and got an iron signal, and I was hoping for a bayonet or even a gun, but insted a small piece of thin metal that once was a German helmet came up from the marsh. But together with it was the chinstrap in good looking condition. This place will be visited again soon, coz who knows what more might be around there. Maybe nothing, but maybe something; this thrill of not knowing is a big part of the joy this hobby gives me :D
Today it is raining a lot so I emptied the bag with the leather and did a count, 23 intact frogs, 9 that has fallen apart and 5 incomplete ammo pouches. A pretty good haul that!

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There are two things that can get me up before 06 in the morning. That is hearing the cat trying to throw up in my shoe, or expedition plans, and yesterday morning it was expedition. The bell rang ten to six and without too much struggle I managed to put my feet into the slippers and find my way to the coffee machine. Baard and I had planned to check out a few places so when breakfast was done I was on the road heading to our meeting point. In a hillside overlooking the valley was the ruins of a small Wehrmacht guard house, and the landowner was going to meet us there. While waiting for the landowner to get ready we spent an hour detecting a thicket where it once had been a large Gebirgsjäger/Heer camp. Much of the camp is gone today because soil has been taken out, but a few percent still exsists as an overgrown forest. It was loads of signals from different metals picked up, but we hadn`t found anything interesting when we drove off to the guardhouse site.
 The farmer told us the little he knew about the place as he showed it to us. Through the forest we could see what a great lookout post this would have been back then. It was nothing more than the foundations of a small house visible. With the detectors we checked the foundations and the surrounding area. A little bit of nails and metal scrap probably from the building was the only thing we could find. Except a modern army tent peg and a few red plastic 7.62 excercise rifle rounds it was completely silent in the forest around. While digging some scrap in the foundation Baard discovered he had lost his pin pointer. It had been ripped from its cord. As he hadn`t had time to walk around in the forest here yet, we knew it had to be somewhere between where we were standing and the last place he dug in the thicket. We strolled back to the car and drove  to the camp. 

 The tall grass showed clearly where we had walked earlier so a minute after leaving the van we had found the pinpointer. Now we decided to just spend the day searching this camp and found a place to put the food and backpacks. Baard went into the forest to search around a barracks foundation while I investigated the area that made out the top shortend of the camp. Here was a ditch going along the entire lenght and it had lots of different signals all the way. That was very interesting and it is probably filled with junk from the camp. Of course I wanted to open it up but it was filled with fallen and cut down trees of all sizes with new sapplings and shrubbery growing. Clearly a job where we will need a tractor, which we are pretty sure the landowner have, we just need to ask him. Then I went back into the camp area and got a nice signal from the Fisher F5. Ca 5 cm under the sand I found an enamelled lid to a kettle or large frying pan. Under it was a padlock, a little scrap metal and a handful of gaming pieces. I went over to Baard with them. Since I had filled the jar I wanted to fill with gaming bits I had promised to give him all the ones I dig up. Around the barrack he had found a couple of coins. A Norwegian one and a beautiful Finnish 5 Markkaa. After walking around for a while we began digging a ditch that gave some strong signals, and we could see the leg from a medic stretcher sticking out from the ground so it could be something interesting in it. It took us a few hours to dig it all up, and it was a lot of hard work, including one or two coffee breaks. As usual the top layer in the ditch was big rocks and roots, and my fingers and muscles are still aching from it. We got out two and a half medical stretchers, all parts in pretty good condition, plus some fabric from the stretchers. We also dug up a large muffler from a vehicle and a square enamelled lid of the size of a Roman shield, I suspect it might be from a field kitchen, but I could be wrong on that. The other finds from this ditch was some tent pegs and a surgical tray together with a small medical bottle and some tins. 

After a small break we continued into the forest and found the foundations of a massive building. It was full of signals, but  had a lot of logs and rotting trees so it ll be for another day. Around the building there were also signals everywhere and soon I had started digging one end of a small ditch. The signal I had picked up was an enamelled bowl from a field kitchen and next to it was a bottle. As I opened up more of the ground more relics came out of it and in just a few minutes I had a pile started. Here was toothpaste tubes, cream tubes, several perfume bottles, a hole-punch machine, a tent peg, pocket knife, parts of a primus, a Daimon field torch and then one half of a EKM (Erkennungsmarke/soldier ID tag)! It even had some letters and numbers on it!! I was so happy! I tried cleaning it up a little and could read that it belonged to a Gebirgsjäger unit!! the quite famous Regiment 139.
I continued digging through the ditch and picked out more bottles, parts from boots and skibindings, a small bakelite box, a purple soap tin made from early plastic and a replacement ski tip made from metal, in good condition! Another awesome find!! After taking out a smashed coffee kettle the ditch began to look empty. I began checking the edges and out fell three halves of EKMs! And then more and more and more! All but one were broken in half and seemed to be blank with no stampings on, but Baard, who had been digging scrap metals from the other side of the ditch looked through them and said some more of the bits was stamped. I couldn`t wait to have them cleaned up and see what was on them. We filled the ditch and tidied up around it and decided we had to quit for the day. For 11 hours we had been searching and digging, so now old knees and joints had begun to tell tales of torment. Covered in mud and clothes kilos heavy with water we discussed the next trip to this camp as we strolled back to the car. I drove Baard back to his summer cabin where he will spend the next three days trying to dry his boots so he is ready for more treasure hunting. We have a crate full of Iron Crosses to find! 
This morning I cleaned up the EKMs. It was 12 blank zink tags (all broken in half), one half alu tag with "GRAZ" and some randomly placed letters and numbers stamped, so probably a "test" tag of some kind. One alu EKM broken in half from Geb.Jäg Regt. 139. It is an interestig tag coz the "R" is made up from a "K" and a "-" . It was one whole blank alu tag in the lot, also very interesting coz it is a field made tag with the centre square holes punched and filed out.