Sea Glass Rarities: The Extraordinary Tale of Finding a Red Shooter Marble

For me, beach combing and picking up sea glass and other relics has always been a pretty Zen experience. I get to be alone with my thoughts and just the sound of waves, wind and an occasional seagull.

My "Happy Place"

On most trips to the beach, nothing extraordinary happens... whether in terms of my surroundings, or in terms of what I find. Sure, now and then I am delighted to find something unusual... and even after some almost 50 years of beach combing, the "thrill of the hunt" has never died.

I go out there because it's peaceful.

I go out there because it allows me to disconnect from the world and-- in some odd way-- reconnect with myself and the source of everything.

I have always been somewhat of a loner, so a beach where only a stalwart few dare to venture is my ideal venue to chill out.

I expect that pretty much all dedicated sea glass enthusiasts have dreams of finding "some great rarity" on one of their outings. Maybe it's finding a sea glass marble. Maybe it's finding that first piece of super rare orange sea glass after 20 years of looking. There's little doubt in my mind that we beach walkers have at least some element of the "collector gene" that strives for ever "better and rarer" things.

So anyway, here's an unusual story of finding an exceptional sea glass rarity.

Some years ago, I found myself doing the Happy Dance on the beach because I found a genuine orange sea glass marble. Orange is the rarest color... finding an orange marble is just that much rarer.

The original orange marble... and then a red marble. But it is not
"THAT" red marble.

I celebrated the find with my wife Sarah... who then looked me in the eye and said "Awesome! Now you need to find the red one!"

I usually take Sarah's statements in stride... but I pay attention, knowing from experience that there's always a deeper meaning behind her statements. Sarah also happens to be one of the world's greatest psychics-- far more accurate and insightful than those "TV psychics." It's a bit beyond belief, at times... but it's true.

"The red one?" I replied

She considered for a bit, and then stated "I have been seeing a red marble out on that beach. It seems buried at the moment, but at some point the sea will shift the sands and it will come up, and you will find it."

In a sense, that started the "quest for the red marble," but we all know that we can't expect the beach to serve up particular sea glass "on demand." It doesn't happen that way... but I would always be looking specifically for a red marble, as I wandered the beach. I knew that if Sarah said it was there, it was there. But three miles of beach is a big place. Just because you've been told for sure that there's a needle in your haystack doesn't mean you can just go and lay your hands on it.

Some years went by, and no red marble. Then... on a rather windy winter day, I found a red marble!

Mightily impressed by Sarah's visionary powers, I was thrilled to show off my new rare treasure. I was a little surprised that Sarah didn't seem to share quite as much in my excitement.

"It's beautiful, don't get me wrong," she said, "but it's not the one I saw... it's still out there. It's much larger and has a faint orange sheen on one side."

A really LARGE red marble, With a bit of orange on one side...

Having collected sea glass for decades, I knew that orange and red marbles are extraordinarily rare. The fact that I had managed to find both an orange and a red marble in my lifetime seemed like a pretty amazing accomplishment. What Sarah was telling me about was clearly a "shooter" sized marble... and a red one, with some orange.

Large red marbles are not something you come across often. I have seen a few offered on eBay in the course of the past ten years, and they tend to sell for impressive amounts after heated bidding.

To find one would be... possibly the rarest piece of sea glass I've found. Ever. Period.

So, time passed... until we come to October 8th, 2015. Almost at the end of a tiring trip to the beach, I saw something that looked like a piece of brown in the sand. I'm not sure why, exactly (I don't typically pick up much brown sea glass), but I decided to poke at it... and realized there was "more there."

Imagine my surprise at what I pulled out! It was LARGE and it was RED and it had that bit of ORANGE on one side! I probably looked like a crazy big flapping bird, hopping around on the beach in my victory dance.

As you can see from the photo with my two previous treasures, it's a very impressive sea glass marble-- and possibly the most amazing find of my beach combing "career." And hats off to Sarah for "seeing it" out there, all those years ago. Seriously folks... what see intuits is real. As you can see,,,

I've already been asked several times if it's for sale.

Not entirely sure, yet... maybe if someone makes the proverbial "offer I can't refuse," I will share it with another collector. For the moment, I am just telling an amazing-- but TRUE-- story!

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