We visited Mel Fisher's Treasure museum, which has more than $400 million in treasure from the shipwreck of the Spanish ship The Atocha in 1622. The ship left Cuba and came near here to get into the gulf stream currents to go back to Spain. The anchor from the atocha is at our marina, 10 ft. from our dock because that's where Mel Fisher docked to unload all the Atocha artifacts and treasure.

The displays are well done and interesting, not only for the value of the objects, but for the insight they offer to 17th century life and mariners. There are hundreds of displays including gold and silver bars and ingots, emeralds, thousands of gold and silver coins, jewelry, canons and everyday shiplife items like a sundial, compass, abrogast (an early sextant), etc. There is also a video explaining how he found the wreck of the Atocha over many, many years.

This is a solid gold chain, worn in the 17th century by the extremely rich. They were also made to transport gold from the new world back to Spain because the tax was lower on jewelry than on gold or silver.

In 1622, the boat carried this long handled cast iron skillet, cookware and butcher knife. I just imagine how CAREFUL they had to be with fire on a wooden ship in the middle of the ocean.

This display showed how the major areas were found, with boxes of silver coins all corroded and silted together into one big block. Coins on the outsode layer were almost unrecognizable, but the ones inside the blocks were in quite good condition after being cleaned.
They even let you hold a solid gold bar ingot. It's in this glass case so you can lift it and feel it, but can't get it out.
On the way to Mel Fishers, we passed the end of highway US1, which runs the entire length of the East Coast from Maine to Florida. The mile marker is for "US 1 Mile 0".