Metal detecting motormouth Deep Digger Dan announces his plans for 2016 (for full effect, turn on the speech-to-voice text gadget...). He announces he's going to stage the biggest metal detecting challenge of all time (in an insular context). He is going to "walk all the way around the coastline of Great Britain metal detecting all the way". The stated length of the proposed journey he gives is actually slightly less than the coastline just of England, minus the larger islands, but even then, that will be a challenge, there are probably at least 80 000 individual landowners whose property the detectorist will be on, whether on the beach itself or coast path - not least the National Trust (who do not normally allow artefact hunting). Also some areas are not accessible, private property or Ministry of Defence etc. Imagine how much a backpack of all the artefacts recovered from a line 8800 km long will weigh at the end of the walk.UPDATE
There is a video explaining this exploit here https://youtu.be/QQ2j5s6sFV0 and there is a diagram showing him walking all around Scotland, so the total is well over the "6000 miles" he says - and also the legislation on metal detecting finds ownership is different there.
Narcissism and a low IQ make for an embarrassing combination.
ReplyDelete(For maximum satisfaction he should consider doing his walk dressed as a chicken.)
Would Deep Digger Dave care to share his plans to be where and when? I'd love to share a few miles discussing the merits of responsible detecting.
ReplyDeleteAs most of the coast round here is variously SPA/Ramsar/NNR/SSSI discussion may centre initially on the £20k fine or 6 months jail he'd be liable to for digging holes in it, landowner consent or not. That's before discussing the usual archaeological chestnuts of recording assemblage, location etc
Also RoW,BOATs, Coastal paths, CRoW land have no implied rights for detecting.
In reality it could be quite a short walk.
I'm sure a man willing to undertake this massive trek would have done his homework. He's raising money for a very worthwhile charity. He's announced it to his HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS followers! ! Dan Holdsworth is not taking this lightly. He's full aware that all eyes are on him (as usual). Dan is full aware of the laws. You sir should do more research on the person before bashing.
ReplyDelete"Research" Deep Digger Dan? You will find the man is very well known to me, he's threatened to close this blog down...
ReplyDeleteWell, yes, let us see him metal detect his way round the English coast. I am sure I will not be the only one watching him very carefully.
I think if one makes any comment at all on the artefact hunter called Deep Digger Dan which does not contain lots of smiley-emoticons, his thousands of fan-boys-and-girls will start trolling you.
ReplyDeleteCome on people, let us talk about the idea of "metal detecting around the coastline of Britain" as an idea. What about butterfly-hunting around the coastline, wild-flower pressing around the coast of England? What's the difference if you "report" what you take?
Paul, I will definitely be watching him, he's a very sneaky individual. I will be producing my own blog soon with some issues that I have with DDD that I want to address publicly. In one of his recent videos (You've probably seen it), he offers to give away an "authentic German WW2 iron cross from Dave in Scotland" in a raffle. I'll be doing some further research into where they obtained this medal. He's also just giving an American WW2 helmet that he claims was found in France, that just doesn't sit right with me. Anyway, have you seen his Facebook stream? On the 14th of April, Daniel Holdsworth went live on his Facebook page to answer some questions from his followers, here he openly discusses his sexual fantasies in a very awkward and almost disturbing manor. I will include the link at the end of this comment. I'll be keeping a close eye on his content, like I said earlier, he's a very sneaky individual and I've noticed that the humourous, nice guy personality that he portrays tends to slip from time to time. https://www.facebook.com/danielholdsworth/videos/vb.652342359/10154148267862360/?type=3&theater
ReplyDeleteWell, I have no time for the facebook profiles of these people. He'll have plenty of opportunity for sexual fantasizing I guess ogling all the semi-naked bodies on the beaches from John O'Groats to Land's End. One possible source of an Iron Cross could be a collectors' market. Some of the items there are taken from the bodies of unburied war-dead in central and eastern Europe. But equally there are a number of fakes around of varying quality. Like most portable antiquities, some way of documenting origins is needed to sort out real finds and planted ones even in WW23 memorabilia. Good luck with the blog, he'll threaten to "have his legal team on yer", I bet.
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