The week end Doldrums again eh? soo as I promised, no posts, then you will be subjected to this. this involves a form of mining at sea . 3 parts.

The seige up at Las colorados will be finished tommorrw, Sunday.

Blame options gal, her fault, so it is dedicated to her.

Don Jose de La Mancha

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good afternoon GALS & guys: Not all of treasure hunting in exotic and romantic places is pure Indiana Jones stuff. Some of the little daily happenings will remain in your memories just as well as finally handling the prize.

During the Revolution against Maximilian, it became quite clear that the French in Mexico were to be abandoned when the American civil war finally ended, As a result French refugees crowded the few ports that were still under French control, one of which was Guaymas. the residual gov't sent a ship up the west coast taking on Refugess and their personal fortunes as well as that of what ever remained of the French gov'ts offices in each.

When it finally arrived at Guaymas it was loaded with both treasure and people. A day or so after it arrived, the rebel war ships placed a blockade across the exit from Guaymas to the Open waters of the Mar de Cortez. They unloaded the refugees then decided that since the ship couldn't escape, they would scuttle it in deep waters.

That night the ship sailed to the mouth of the harbor then turned next to the coast line, sailed north to a certain point, again turned and sailed in the direction on a new course until it hit the 300 ft level. There they took cross bearings then scuttled the ship. The captain and the skeleton crew returned to Guaymas in one of the life boats where they were picked up by the Rebel forces, interrogated, books taken from them, then released to go to France.

The data that the Rebels had disappeared over the years , but the captain upon reaching France remembered them quite clearly, and wrote them down.

The first that I heard of this was when I was sitting on a bench in the plaza discretely ogling the passing gals on the sunday promenade. I noticed two Americans approaching, obviously looking for me. They stopped in front of me, introduced themselves, then said that they had to talk to me on some serious business. I indicted the empty space next to me and invited them to sit down. Johnny, the apparent leader, quickly came to the point. he said that he had a dive shop in southern Calif ( another MEL?) and said that through connections, had gotten the data of the French ship from the decedents of the French capt and that they had formed a group to salvage it. One of their key personnel was a supposed Mexican diver.

They had arrived and set up operations but after a week noticed that the key man was not consistent on his bearings. One day while he was off of the ship in Guaymas they searched his belongings and had found my name, hence had come to see me to see if I would head up their salvage operation since so far it had been a colossal failure. When I hear the man's name, I realized that they had probably been taken by a con game in that the data had never been investigated , that the man and I had talked of the possibilities of salvage some months earlier, but I had decided that the information needed further checking. They made me an excellent offer so I agreed to give it a try, we shook hands and so the salvage operation was off and running, on a hand shake..

I went to Guaymas where they put me up in a deluxe bungalow at the 'Playa de Cortez' with an open booking for whatever I needed. I was there for a few days checking over the operation, then asked to go to the ship, where I stayed for the rest of the operation. The ship was an older wooden hulled one that they claimed had been Lionel Barrymore's personal yacht, now called El Vida".. on the aft deck they had constructed a wooden room large enough for 6 men in double bunks. There were windows on all sides with one door, this will come into play later in the story of the salvage operation.

Among those present was the gentleman that I had discussed the possibilities of salvage months earlier and an American that was for all practical purposes a moral less, beach comber, Don. We also had some local Indians aboard for general labor, among which was this 6' plus Yaqui, Juanito. His particular delight, when we made anchorage in the harbor of Guaymas was to simply jump over board , swim to shore, get drunk, chase the gals in a local happy house, , and fight with the Mexican police, jump back into the bay and swim back to the ship. He soon became excessively friendly with me, occasionally brushing up against me?? I was a bit upset with him, then one day I told him off, I said "look you big sob, while you are two of me I am an excellent shot so back off, I don't go for that, I only go for gals'. He just grunted but did behave from then on.. Then one day I found out what was going on, my nice friend Don, had specifically told the huge Yaqui that I had the hots for him. His idea of a joke sigh.©@

My vengeance came later.

So you see that not every day is a day for Indiana Jones, just daily living. There are many more pages to this little salvage story my friends if you don't get bored.

Don Jose de La Mancha