The Pearl Ship

[Isayhello2u]

although the above articles answers the questions about Evans.
they still do not quite explain away the charley clusker story or the Indian affirmations as to the existance of a ship
or the September 27, 1873 article in the california paper "Inyo Independant"

Im still trying to figure out who the james expedition in the "inyo" report refers to.

as a side note I've sometimes wondered if the "illusion" was a clue to
another lost treasure in the same area. Aka Brandt's Mine.

 

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[gollum]

I read a story a couple of years ago that said in about 1971, a husband and wife were hiking around the Eastern end of the Fish Creeks, when they got a little turned around. They followed a path (that turned out to be a mountain goat path) into a steep arroyo. They found an old mine that had a rock cairn in front of it. In the rockpile was an old can with a note "This is Hank's Mine"

After they found their way out, they were never able to find their way back to the mine. Who knows?

That's the most recent thing I've heard about the Hank Brandt Mine.

Best,

Mike

 

[Isayhello2u]

PHOTOS of the Pearl Ship

Ok rechecking my files I came across some xerox copies of magazine articles about the lost ship Right now im trying to remember who sent them to me because
I dont know which magazines these articles are from. the one article did include "ship photos" the article is titled new clues surface to three fabulous Caches
the article is about George Mroczkowski's finds , and also mentions Larry Justus
since it mentions a december 1983 issue of Treasure I think it may be from that magazine Can Anyone Identify the magazine, its publication Date and the articles author for me ?

 

[tesoro dog]

Hello Everyone!!!!
Just joined and altogether new at this. Here goes, last year I stopped off at the historical museam in palm desert, ca. Looking for any old treasure stories in or near the coachella valley. At the museam they have a complete set of the Desert Magazine going back to the 40s or 50s. I found a story of an old, old ship supposedly found in a group of hills or mountains south of the salton sea. the shape of the ship still visible imbeded on the side of a hill. Wood planks or petrified wood planks were also found. I made copies of the articles and they are around here someplace. Mountains are south of salton sea and west of the town of Brawley. I will look for copy of article. And will try to post it. Also i have read of another shipwreck a viking ship with shields still mounted on the sides. but i think the location is probably closer to the borrego springs badlands.

 

[gollum]

Hey TD,

I know both of those stories.

The first ship is supposed to be on Superstition Mountain. I have been all over there and not seen it. Much of the Northern Side of the Mountain is on the Naval Bombardment Range, and is Off-Limits to civilians.

The "Viking" Ship is supposed to be somewhere between I-8 and the Gulf of California. There are supposedly a couple of pictures of it, but I have never been able to find them.

The Pearl Galleon is supposed to be somewhere in Coyote Canyon, NorthEast of Borrego Springs. An old prospector was supposed to have found it in (I think) 1907. Problem with the Pearl Galleon Story is that all the land is so acidic, any exposed pearls would have disintegrated loooooong ago.

Best,

Mike

 

[tesoro dog]

Say Gollum, hello everyone

Also read years back bout viking ship found back in 50s or 60s by couple that ran either library or chamber of c in the city of Julian, that were hiking around badlands went up canyon, saw ship up on side wall, kinda high up. by time they returned again, earthquake had blocked off canyon. (Heard this one before? Uh?) Same ship man from Tecate was supposed to have found. shields and all. I would dumb guess 50 to 75 ft. higher than ancient shoreline, maybe at sea level? part of which runs right around Superstition mountain east of Brawley.

Suerte to ALL, tony

 

[Isayhello2u]

- viking ship

Tony you mean Louis & Myrtle Botts of Julian they met a prospector who showed them photos of what Myrtle says looked like a viking ship. The Prospector gave them directions to where he saw the ship but the earthquake of 1933 made it impossible for them to follow his route. Myrtles papers were left to the Julian Pioneer society.
there were other sightings. The Indio Date Palm Oct. 4 1951 (Indio Ca., newspaper)
had an article "A ghost of the vikings" by Paul Wilheilm
there is a good online source of all the ship stories here.
http://www.klaxo.net/hofc/other/lostship.htm#lost

 

[tesoro dog]

Isayhowdy2u

Thats who it was!! My memory says DUH!DUH! But my enthusiasm says YES,YES. I say Hello, ? to U. Do the couples "Papers" give Excell, good, fair directions to the approx, area or location of canyon? I would guess it would have good access coming from Tecate too. Vaquero Story. Maybe a trail normally used in those days to get from Tecate to Borrego, Westmoreland, Brawley, El Centro? Unless he headed to specifically for that canyon. Isay, I have read some of your posts, and I would bet you know, right off the top of your head what the Elevation is for Ocotillo Wells. If it too high, then my dumb guess for the Viking ship would be the fish creek mtns. or the borrego malpais (badlands). The picture of the sail in the mountains someone posted, could it be matched to the right area in the fish creek mtns. If so, a flyby could be made, even if it is off limits. Same ship?

Feeling Very Cool in answering your Post ADIOS, Tony

 

[Isayhello2u]

Sorry
I have never gone to look at what if anything Mrs. Botts left the Julian Pioneer Society. There may well be nothing there.
I only found out a very short time ago that she had left them her "collection".
In my opinion if she had left a copy of the directions they would not have been clear. The editor of the original desert magazine Choral Pepper, who had interviewed Mrs Botts, would have gone looking if she'd gotten good directions.

As my interest is more in the boat west of El Centro than it is in the Viking. which
I think is futher south I don't think I will be asking to look through the Botts papers anytime soon.

 

[Isayhello2u]

Re: viking ship

Hi again Tony.

re ocatillo's elevation I don't know its elevation.

But even if i did I believe the current elevation is now a foot or more higher than it was when the lake existed.
the Salton trough is a rift valley the bottom is dropping and the sides are being uplifted. Though you would need a geologist to tell you where and at what rate of speed. I think the bathtub ring the lake left has a higher elevation in the south end then it does the north which would give a clue as to the real elevation you should be looking for.

The University of Redlands using the GSI software from the Environmental Systems Research Institute (ESRI) did a study of the ancient lake levels.
http://www.redlands.edu/x12936.xml

I think I should mention that I am more of an arm chair researcher than an active hunter. Health concerns limit me to staying on paved roads. In fact I'm off work today because of a recent surgery.

 

[Isayhello2u]

the drying of the lakes in the colorado river -- The Pearl Ship

Since the colorado river was already part of the area being uplifted It would not have had that much effect on the river flowing into the lake. it may have had an effect on the outflow of the water from the lake to laguna salada or the gulf. A quake could move the river away from the north side of the delta for a year or two but like china's Qiantang river which also has a high tidal bore. The waters from the colorado/gila river changed their location in the delta area from either side with regularity until people interfered

I think a more direct cause was the world wide weather event known as the "little ice age"
which caused a mega drought in the Sw united states.

if you google the keywords "colorado river flow tree ring studies"
you will get find articles about the droughts that affected the rivers flow.

http://standeyo.com/NEWS/06_Food_Water/060527.CO.R.drought.html

Ps the redlands article was that the average height of the ancient lake lines is currently 40ft
above sea level they used technology/ software by ESRI to create a map of the ancient lake.

 

[Isayhello2u]

good luck. post a note of what you find (although i think it will be more in the nature of spent bullets etc.) re stitches. I don't mind the stitches, I mind the missing pound of flesh that used to be under where the stitches are.

 

[xplror]

at the time the colorado river ran through the imperial valey wich is a 100 feet below sea level-anearthquake rerouted the river and stranded the ship in the vicinity of the superstion hills outside of el centro ca where it was covered up by sand dunes- just west of these hills by plaster city is a bed of oysters in the desert. whether the treasure is still on the ship is another question? the ship itself would be a great find. plan to go there when it cools down as at the moment it is over 110 degrees there. probably in november

 

[xplror]

the sea of cortez used to in the not so distant past,extend almost to palm springs area. most of the area from the salton sea to the sea of cortez is either at sea level or below. over the border in mexico is a volcano called zanetec,i believe , which is the result of a rift uplifting the area from sea level to about 80 feet above,thereby cutting off the influx from the sea of cortez. this area is geologically very active , having 3+ magnitude earthquakes quite often. between I-8 and the mexican border is a large oyster bed in the desert, it is listed on google as a shell bed.they are oysters shell as i have been there but didnt think to see if they had any pearls. it usually takes 4700 oysters to find one pearl. i am going to go see if can find any. usually the spanish traded the indians for the pearls, as well as diving for them. good luck

 

[Isayhello2u]

Are you talking about the 4 million year old fossil oyster bed
Although Mexico's laguna salada Basin area was often innundated by the ocean (the last incursion being in the 1800's) the Salton Basin area has been cut off from the ocean for a much longer time. There was however a fresh water lake ....

which reminds me .. does anyone know
are the Californian sand spikes only found near signal mountain?

 

[Tom_in_CA]

Isayhello, Finally a voice of reason: You say "the Salton Basin area has been cut off from the ocean for a much longer time" You're right. Some folks would argue that there was periodic inundations/surges coming up from the Gulf of California, up through the Colorado River channel. Perhaps historically this was true, that the sea extended up that far, at one time, or had tidal flukes that went that far, etc.... But that was ANCIENT history. Nothing recent enough that the European influence (late 1400s/early 1500s) had ships that could go there. Certainly not deep enough for a friggin ship to float along!

The fact that there is seashells, oyster beds, or whatever, is not conclusive. Heck, there's whale bone fossils in the middle of the USA, on mountain tops, etc... That is prehistoric stuff, and not reflective any proof for sea levels in recent history.

As for the earthquake theory, that would have to mean that a nearly 100 mile stretch (from the mountains the west, to the mountains on the east) would have had to have been raised up. Seeing as how this is a very arid region, evidence of such an earthquake would still be visible (chasms, ground that doesn't meet together d/t higher vs lower, etc...). For example: in the CA central valley, there is evidence of land that was separated by earthquakes, where.... you have to step down or step up. Or creeks that no longer align, etc... Those are from earthquakes that were even before recorded history here in CA, yet they are clearly visible, despite erosion, rainfall, etc.... Those are just little jags in the earth. Contrast that to the kind of earthquake, and resultant reformation of the earth that would be required to block off an entire sea from an entire "bay" would leave evidence that could be seen. Once again, unless you're talking prehistoric, and then erosion, yes, would slowly erode the clear lines.

The fact that old maps showed CA as an island is also inconclusive. Mapmakers had all sorts of fanciful ideas, and oft-times made guesses, based on heresay. The depiction of CA as an island is merely because someone guessed the Colorado kept going, or they just sincerely saw Baja CA as a thin stretch, and thought "aha, an island", without checking it out all the way. Subsequent mapmakers just continued to copy this mistake, even as recent as the late 1700s.

So once again, sorry to be a killjoy. It's a nice story, but alas, it's only that.

 

[Isayhello2u]

Tom now I'm not saying there is a ship. or that the stories are anything more than legend. but this the theoretical question.

If when the Colorado flowed on the west side of the delta (where it is today) a Steamboat
could use the tidal surge to help get to Callville (lake Meade)

When the full force of the Colorado flowed into the ancient lake, filling it and the outflow of the lake went to the gulf . what stops a shallow drafted boat of a size comparable to the steamboat from coming up the lake outflow river into the lake? A far far shorter distance?

 

[xplror]

steamships made a regular run up the colorado until they started building dams, there was a coast guard station at laughlin nv untl 20 yrs ago as the gov considered the colorado as a navigatable river long after the dams made it prohibitive. af course now las angeles steals the water before it gets to the sea of cortez so you are lucky to get a row boat up from there these days. salton sea last flooded in the 1950,s when a hurricane/tropical storm came up the river and was stalled in the tri-state area,dumping 3-4 inches an hour for a week straight. the river came out of its banks and filled the salton sea. the oyster shell i saw didnt look anywhere close to 4 million yrs old. does anyone know the name of the spanish ship as i want to see if there are any record in madrid. ps the chinese came up the colorado 3,000 yrs ago-hso and shu- they ended up by the gand canyon and taught the indians how to make pottery- the chinese have translated their story into modern manderin , i dont know if there is an english version or not

 

[Tom_in_CA]

xplror & Isayhello: So basically what you're saying is that: Granted, the possibility of the Imperial Valley being a northward portion of the Gulf of California, is too ancient to try to connect to the Pearl Ship legend. Ok, glad we are agreed on that So the next explanation is to say the area of the current Salton sea was a "back-wash", so to speak, of the Colorado River. Ie.: no different than the forces that formed the current Salton Sea (engineering mistakes while canal building for ag-irrigation). The same forces were at work in 1400s/1500s, that..... back then.... could've overflowed, or temporarily diverted water from the Colorado into the the Salton Sink.

Interesting theory. My grandfather settled in Brawley in the 1920s. Before he died in the late 1970s, when I was a kid, I remember him talking about the formation of the Salton Sea, since he was nearly a pioneer of that area. Maybe not from the teens, when it was formed, but had talked firsthand with some or the even earlier pioneers. He told me that when the finally got the Colorado River back flowing the right way, and plugged the dikes or whatever, that one of the immediate concerns was "what do we do with this new giant body of water?" People naturally assumed it would just dry up, once you took away its incoming source, since..... afterall, this is the desert But what ended up happening was, this was when ag was taking off down there. All that irrigation runoff (that didn't exist before the teens and '20s) ends up flowing into the sea, thus countering/balancing evaporation.

So perhaps back in the 1400s/1500s, a periodic such sea formed, that DID evaporate back to desert? (since there was no replenishing ag. wastewater runoff). This still seems like you're "grasping for straws". Kind of like proving UFOs or whatever, all arguments from mere extremely remote possibilities. Like, a legend is invented first, and because people so much want to believe it (afterall, who can resist a good treasure story) that they get a string of contingencies, that are wildly unlikely, and rely on a host of assumptions, to try to prop of a possibility.

Then there is the line of thought that concedes that: since the geologic proof doesn't support any flooding or ocean extensions, except in pre-historic times, therefore the pearl ship legend could STILL be true, IF you figure in that pre-historic Europeans came here! Doh You know, like Vikings, Chinese, etc.... back 1000 to 2000 yrs. ago, way before the current era of 1492 to the present. That's like trying to debate if there is life on Saturn's moons. There is just no way to discuss that, other than speculation. Any of the non-native-indian artifacts that have been found, that purported to predate Columbus' discovery of North America, are very sparse indeed. Like.... a pre-Columbus Viking coin or artifacts in Greenland, or a mysterious chinese thingy in Oregon or Washington, etc... But they are singular items. You don't hear of entire ships and their cargo, or pearl hunting cargos and commercial trafficking, etc ... They would've been lucky just to touch our shores, on the east and the west, muchless rounding Baja CA, and finding some desert place to beach for no reason. Just doesn't make sense.

What is the evidence that chinese came to Colorado 3000 yrs. ago? Just because a legend exists in China? That's just a legend to proove a legend. Circular logic.

 

[Oroblanco]

Greetings,

Why is it that a negative attitude is the "voice of reason"? Can we say for a certainty, that it was totally impossible for a ship in the 1500's to have sailed into what it today the Salton Sea? If you take the time to check the sources, you will find that the ship sailed up the Colorado river, THEN into an 'inland sea' and the ship was then unable to return to the river. No description of the Salton sea being one vast extension of the gulf. The Colorado river has in fact changed its' course and flowed into the Salton sink even in historic times, so why is it exactly that this could not have happened just as the original sources describe?

The Spanish kept very good records, if you care to research this it IS a matter of record, not fanciful story-telling for the entertainment of the readers.

As for ancient visitors to the Americas, I would point out that several ancient shipwrecks have been found on our shores - including one found by divers examining the Bimini "road" mysterious stone formation and examined by a Yale professor who pronounced it a Phoenician ship and at least 3000 years old. Human beings have been using the sea as a highway ever since the first man floated on a log, the whole idea of 'isolation' is actually a bit ridiculous if you think about it. Europeans were afraid of the deep oceans during the Dark ages and into Medieval times, but prior to this mankind was in fact sailing from continent to continent for centuries. Want proof? Look up "chickens in America" specifically the chickens found being raised by Amerindians when first "discovered" by European explorers; then look up the origins of cotton - yes there are two types, Old World and New World, but in fact European explorers found Amerindians raising Old World cotton in Mexico. Then you can do similar research on such things as spices, or hemp, bottle gourds, even American corn and American tobacco and coca, found in Egyptian mummies. (In one case an American tobacco leaf was found WITHIN the wrappings of an ancient Egyptian mummy, so the whole "it must have been from similar African plants" theory is simply wrong.) Recent DNA tests showed that certain Amerindian tribes have direct relations to Europeans too.

The statement about the finding of a SINGLE Viking coin in Greenland (actually I think you are referring to the Norse coin found in Maine) you seem to dismiss - yet if we are to believe that "isolation" theory, there must be NO such coin, relic, artifact,plant, or DNA found anywhere in the Americas. It would be far too lengthy a post to list ALL such evidence here, but if anyone is interested I would be happy to recommend a few books on the subject. (I have been working on a book on ancient visitors to the Americas for some eight years now and have a fair amount of research.) The main problem seems to be that people assume that knowledge and contact between the Old World and the New MUST have been either massive or none, and the truth is that contact was in fact taking place, but always on a small scale and always sporadic, with only ONE recorded attempt at colonizing that I was able to trace, and even this was later ordered to be withdrawn by the senate of the colonizers. (Carthage) Does this mean that there were Roman legions marching around in Illinois? Of course not, but crossings of the oceans DID take place, in many cases accidentally, but such contact was taking place. Accidental crossings have indeed taken place in historic times as well, in one case leading to the discovery of Brazil for example.

My apologies for going off on a tangent here, just seems there is a tendency to be dismissive of such tales as a "ship in the desert" and this negative bias/doubt is ill-founded. It is good to keep a skeptical mind, but only when that mind is open to receive and consider all the evidence.

I think most all treasure hunters are at least in part 'history-detectives' - people who research the facts and examine all the evidence before making their conclusions, even when such a fanciful-sounding tale as a ship full of pearls in the desert is encountered. Remember that people did not believe that Troy or Mycenae ever existed nor that the Trojan war ever happened, and many other instances where "the voice of reason" pronounced the tales of our ancestors to be fairy tales but have since been proven to be fact. Even such far-fetched things as dragons and unicorns can be traced back to garbled reports of encounters with strange and dangerous animals (crocodiles and one-horned Asian rhinos in these cases) that later became doubted as "myths". (How would you describe a giraffe to someone who had never seen one, but had seen camels and leopards? In this case,to the Greeks, the giraffe became a "Camel-leopard" - since they knew what Camels were and what Leopards were and this is how the animals were described to them. Naturally there was some confusion and surprise when they actually encounted giraffes and found them to be vegetarians.)

Good luck and good hunting to you friends, my apologies if anything I said was of offence - none was intended. I hope you find the treasures that you seek.

your friend,
Roy ~ Oroblanco