Putting the ‘I’ into IBC
International Beach Combing conference 2017 – Big Island Hawaii
I first read about a beach combing conference on social media and immediately thought wow!!! It had been going to a few years, well 7 to be exact and the 8th conference was coming up….it was very far away and probably a lot of money…but I thought I’d send a message and get some more info. I also said if you ever need any specimens or a representative from Scotland I’d love to come to a conference. There’s a 12 hour time difference from Hawaii to Scotland, so by the morning I received a message saying I would be welcome to come and give a lecture and get a fee for doing the lecture also!!!
I really felt that The stars had aligned for it to happen and I would put my expensive 26 hour travelling time and cost of 3 planes on our visa card. I was so excited I couldn’t even read all of the message from Deacon aka Dr Beachcomb…I now had to work out a plan for childcare after school for our daughter, but with the support of my husband Martin and our close friends, it all worked out.
The IBC’ers were keen to hear my talk (as I was the only one attending who put the ‘I’ into International as the rest of the attendees were all from USA). Everyone was so welcoming and for the first time I sold some of my vast collection of Sea glass rare finds such as sea glass stoppers from old bottles, frosted sea glass marbles, sea worm beautiful pottery and some of my collection from my Seaham (In NE England) trip. We can find amazing pieces on our beaches here on the East Coast of Scotland, due to our busy shipping routes and many potteries and bottle factories.
The conference was fantastic and very educational based which I loved, we heard fantastic lecturers from volcanologist’s, archaeologists and from Dr Beachcomb too. My talk went well, even though I did end up loosing 2 of my power point slides, but that’s another story!!!
We all stayed at a Motel, and this allowed us to eat together which was wonderful, we shared car drives and went on excursions to find shells, sea glass and to see wild turtles basking in the afternoon sunshine on the lava rocks.
I made life long friends and 5 of those friends have all come to visit and stay with me and my family here in Edinburgh & Fife.
What a truly life enriching experience.