Growing up in Texas you can imagine how many summers I spent on the river as a kid. If you can’t guess, let me just tell you it was a lot! I had always heard of people losing things while floating. Quite a few thoughts would cross my mind when I would hear this. Like, why did they have that with them in the first place? How did they let that get away from them? How did you not stop and look for it immediately?

My husband and I have carried on the tradition of spending summers at the river and our kids have heard the stories, and have seen the YouTube videos, of everything that has been found in the river. This past weekend was pretty much our last weekend off before all of our school chaos begins. The girls start school volleyball in like a week. So of course we spent the weekend at a friend’s condo on the Comal and my son spent most of his time fishing and treasure hunting. While we would float, he would swim along with goggles diving to the bottom of the river to see if he could find anything of value.

Sunday morning we did a family float from the condo to the public exit and he found a few bungee cords, some cool looking rocks, and a bathing suit strap. I know...big time treasure. We went up to have lunch and when he was done he announced, “I’m going down to the river to find some treasures!” I was like OK dude, good luck with that and laughed it off.

About 20 minutes later he comes busting through the condo door and said, “MOM, you said I wouldn’t find anything...well LOOK!” Then from behind his back he whips out an iPhone!

I could not believe it. I have always heard of this type of thing happening but NEVER did I think that this kid would actually find something like this! Well of course it was soaking wet but still had about 5% battery life left. I went and set it on my charger hoping that whoever lost it would think to ping it or call it. There were already a ton of missed calls and texts but I couldn’t open the phone because it was locked. I knew that if I was able to keep the power on that there was a chance we would find the owner. Then, at about 8:30pm I heard a weird noise coming from the bedroom and it hit me, “IT’S THE LOST PHONE PINGING!” Everyone that was there got so excited, it was kind of ridiculous, then the phone rang!. We all screamed and I answered, “HELLO I HAVE YOUR PHONE!” The young voice on the other line was so excited and I could hear the relief. She was no longer in New Braunfels, but had gone home to Houston. I am happy to report that the phone is now on its way back to its young owner safe and sound.

Of course stupid me did not ask her, “How in the HECK did you lose your phone?” Like they make cases now that float and connect to your neck. You better believe that I will take the “treasure hunt” on the river more seriously and next time I will get my questions answered.