Diver1111, have you ever caught anything on your side scan that might be a one horse open sleigh? WinnipesaukeeDiver told a great story about finding one in Wolfeboro. If you ever come across it, I'd love to see a video or pictures of it. Thanks.
As posted by WinnipesaukeeDiver...
One day my old dive buddy Cliff suggests we do an exploratory dive in Wolfeboro Bay to find the reputed “One Horse Open Sleigh” that went through ice about a hundred years ago. “Won’t this make a great dive site to take accomplished students”, he said. I thought to myself, “What’s wrong with this picture”? The thought of two of us exploring the bottom of Wolfeboro bay; looking for something that had been lost and written about in a book a hundred years ago. What’s the chance of finding this relic? But, any reason to go exploring is good enough, besides we could find all sorts of other lost treasures.
It didn’t take long to find it, maybe the second or third dive and there it was right where the book said it was. It was a black sleigh with red pin stripping sitting upright on the bottom. How cool is that? The harness was still attached and both Cliff and I had the same idea at same time. There must be some brass buckles, bells and adornments somewhere and we started to pull them up out of the murky bottom. I watched as Cliff followed a section the harness out for a ways, tugging it up into view. He finally got to the end and gave a big yank and the whole horse’s head popped up out of the bottom… The look on Cliff face was priceless as he gasped for air and lurched back, I heard a muffled scream as he couldn’t drop it fast enough. Cliff signaled to me with a diagonal hand slash across his chest ending with a fist and thumb up; meaning this dive is over, right now. As we began our assent back to the surface, Cliff’s eyes were as big as saucers while he kept shaking his head form side to side and our rapid ascent alarms were chipping all the way up. Once on the surface Cliff spit out is regulator and gasped for fresh air. I said, “Wow that was some find; what are you going to do with your horse head?” Cliff’s only comment was, “I’ve had enough let’s get out of here”.
The “One Horse Open Sleigh” is still down there complete with the harness, brass buckles, bells and adornments and yes, the horse. We never did take any students to the site; Cliff thought it might be too intense for new divers, besides it’s a little deep and in the middle of the bay. I never could find the site again, its deep, dark and cold down there and the visibility is so poor I could have swam right past it on several occasions and never seen it.
|