Shipwreck Hunting near La Push

washingtonian

Gold Member
Sep 26, 2005
6,507
12,899
Puget Sound
Detector(s) used
Equinox 800, Whites DFX
Hey guys,

I had a big outing a couple weekends ago that actually kind of sparked my interest in metal detecting again. For a couple years, I've been researching a shipwreck off the coast of La Push. I'd heard about it through the grapevine, and the biggest thing that piqued my interest was hearing that there were old coins (and even some gold coins) found at this site long ago. I didn't know too many of the specifics, so I started to do more research online.

I eventually found a Native American journal (Quillayute Indian Tradition | Hobucket | Washington Historical Quarterly) that talked about Spanish and French shipwrecks that ran aground near La Push in the early 1800s. The French wreck particularly interested me, because there are stories that they didn't know what to do with the gold on the ship and dumped it on the beach so they could use the chests holding it for clothing storage. That might be a big of a tall tale, but there were other rumors of people finding gold coins on the beach 100+ years ago so that didn't seem too far-fetched to be based in history sometime long ago.

My buddy and I have been researching it for a couple years and wanted to go at the lowest tides of the year which around here is typically the 3rd weekend of June (they line up with the summer solstice). We dusted off the old DFXs, hopped in his car, and drove there on a Friday night, getting in after midnight. We slept in the back of his car and got up five hours later to hit the beach.

From our research, it seemed like we were in the right place. The beach is called "First Beach" and is just south of the river mouth where the French ship is said to have crashed. We searched for a few hours and didn't turn up anything but junk.

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Early morning at "First Beach".

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Junk finds from morning #1.

Well, we were a little disappointed but not deterred. We decided that we might try another beach nearby to see if maybe our estimates for where the shipwreck hit were a little off. We grabbed breakfast in town, and then made the 20 minute drive to the next beach. We quickly ran into a road block because the road was closed for construction. The only option on foot was to hike a considerable distance. We turned back toward the town and grabbed some breakfast to think.

We told our waitress about our problem and she mentioned that we might see if someone down at the marina could help us. We talked to a couple locals who eventually pointed us to the man who runs the marina. He is a classic navy veteran who clearly loves his life by the sea. We told him about what we were doing and he started to tell us about the history of the place and the shipwrecks he knew of. He said he didn't know about a shipwreck at First Beach but that he had heard stories of some of the Native Americans finding gold coins back in the day and skipping them like stones because they didn't know of their value :BangHead:.

After some more talk, he recommended that we go to the next beach we were interested in and told us about an old Chilean shipwreck a few miles up the beach. We decided it probably made sense to just camp out there to have more time to explore. We spent a couple hours getting some supplies together, grabbing lunch in Forks (where the vampire-themed Twilight books took place) and then came back to the marina. He put us in touch with one of the guys at the marina who chartered us across to the other beach for $20.

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A shot outside the restaurant where we got lunch.

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Our new friend chartering us across the river.

We got over there, jumped in the ocean, took and nap, and decided we were game for the 3.5 mile hike to our new site. I'll start by saying that a 7-mile roundtrip hike on rocky coastline with a detector and shovel in hand on a 90 degree day wasn't my smartest life choice. That said, it was a beautiful hike. We saw eagles, seals and all kinds of other sea life. It took us so long to get there that we only ended up having 45 minutes or so to detect. Again, there wasn't anything to be found here except junk. My best find was a modern fork :laughing7:.

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6+ eagles in a tree seen during the hike.

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Finds from that evening.

We trekked back and made some hot dogs around the fire. It was a serene night because no one else was on the beach because of the road closure. We decided to call it a night and try the beach we were on in the morning before heading back.

I woke up the next morning to a terrific sunrise over the lagoon. We hit the nearby beach for a couple hours, again turning up nothing but junk. We got in touch with our new friend who chartered us back across the water into town where we wrapped up our trip by saying thanks to the guy who runs the marina. We told him about our adventure and what we'd been looking for, and something seemed to come back to him. He said that a long time ago, the river mouth was actually further north than it is now. A bunch of logs blocked its exit into the ocean and as a result it ended up turning further south. The Army Engineering Corps saw this and knowing it was a danger, built a huge jetty to keep the river flowing in its new direction. As a result, the original river mouth is now totally buried under a huge jetty.

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Sunrise over the lagoon.

I think the shipwreck site we were looking for which was supposedly just south of the river mouth (as it stood 200+ years ago) no longer really exists because of those changes. That said, it was an amazing weekend of activity, sightseeing, and being in the thrill of the hunt. I hope to have more treasure to show next time, but I have plenty of mental and relational treasures from this weekend to know it was worth it.

I've got permission for a few sites closer to Seattle for this summer, so hopefully I'll have something to show soon. Thanks for reading this and happy hunting everyone!

-Washingtonian
 

Mackaydon

Gold Member
Oct 26, 2004
23,981
22,627
N. San Diego Pic of my 2 best 'finds'; son & g/son
🏆 Honorable Mentions:
2
Detector(s) used
Minelab Explorer
Primary Interest:
Shipwrecks
Memories.........
Back in the day, I used La Push and Neah Bay as ports while searching for the 'SS Pacific' that went down off the coast near (??) Neah Bay.
The ship rounded Cape Flattery at 7:30 PM one night then collided and wrecked after a collision with another vessel bound for Nanaimo before 9 PM.
Since my search attempt, others have looked for the same target. Maybe you and your buds will be the lucky ones.
HH.
Don.........
 

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