Viking Longboat Found in California Mountains!

[gollum]

Okay. Since this is the only Viking Longboat Story I know of, I will put it here in the area for a different "Lost Ship of the Desert" Story.

Everybody has heard of the "Lost Pearl Ship" of Capt Juan Iturbide. Even more amazing (to me) is the lesser known story regarding the finding of what appeared to be a Viking Longboat in the Coyote Mountains just Southwest of Palm Springs, Ca. The story appears in several places online and in print, but I will use the following website as a reference for this, because both the author and his father had a chance to personally interview Myrtle Botts before she passed away. Both believe her story.

VIKING DESERT SHIP

The original story was told by Mrs. Myrtle Botts:

On the morning of March 9, 1933 Botts, a biosearcher herself on a search for new species of desert wildflowers, together with her husband Louis, were camped in California's Anza-Borrego Desert near Agua Caliente Springs in the mountains just west of the Salton Sea when an old prospector wandered into their camp. He told them that a few days before he had seen what looked like a wooden ship with a snake or dragon's head carved on the bow poking out of the canyon wall nearby. After getting directions, the next day the couple hiked to the canyon and sure enough, just as the old prospector said, the bow of a wooden ship was sticking out of the cliff. By the time they reached the site it was getting late and in that the ship was so high up on the cliffside to see firsthand without special equipment of somekind they made a notation of where it was located and went back to camp, planning to return the next day with ropes and such.
That evening at 5:55 PM the 1933 Long Beach earthquake hit, destroying a great deal around them including their campsite. They felt they had no choice but to return home, resolving to come back the next weekend and take photographs of the craft. When they returned the following weekend the canyon trail they hiked the week before was completely blocked. So too, after searching most of the day climbing over rocks, boulders, and landscapes they no longer recognized they were unable to find the canyon wall or the ship, the earthquake apparently covering all traces.

Now, that in and of itself is a good story. But that is all it is......a good story. So, are there any other references to Vikings in the Southwest US? Let's see:

I have a friend that has been studying and documenting the history of the Seri Indians for about twenty years (they call themselves Comca'ac). Part of the tribal history is that of a group of Red Haired Giants that lived on Tiburon Island in the Sea of Cortez. They were very aggressive, but the Seri (aggressive themselves) did have some exchanges with them. Unfortunately, due to the fact that the Seri (Comca'ac) were never completely pacified by the Spanish, they were hunted for bounty and almost completely eradicated. There are only about 80 or so Seri Indians left in the world.



Okay. So we have a story that may mesh with Mrs. Botts' Longboat Story. Anything else?

Absolutely! If one were to draw a line from Tiburon Island up to Death Valley, the area near Mrs Botts' Story is right there. But, between Tiburon Island and The Coyote Mountains is a large boulder with a very interesting petroglyph:



The petroglyph is of a single masted ship. Pearl Ship? Viking Ship?

Okay, anything else? Why yes! There is! In 1931, a Dr. F. Bruce Russell supposedly fell through the roof of a cave by Death Valley. In this cave system were the remains of several gigantic men around nine feet in height. They had red hair. This story comes several years before Myrtle Botts' Story, and long before the Seri (Comca'ac) History of Red Haired Giants was ever heard by whites.

Who has something to add here?

Mike

 

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[motel6.5]

I read of a more modern day searcher looking for the Vikeing boat did find a Vikeing shield and a Vikeing sword. I don"t recall the reading source. I also heard of a Nevada lake that revealed a very large human skeleton as its shores were drying up. The skeleton was partially wrapped in some kind of strange cloth...

 

[gollum]

Hey Motel,

I read the story about the guy that supposedly found a round shield.

I believe the other story you are referring to is the Paiute Indian Story about a tribe of red haired giants (again) that lived in a cave (Lovelock Cave, Nevada). and again, it is in an almost straight line:



Just some food for thought.

Mike

 

[motel6.5]

Google ,large skeleton found in Nevada desert. Their are plenty of photos and storys of giant skeletons,fingers ,skulls,etc,found all over the world,and Nevada also.

 

[anzayounggun]

so on this story if you research the 1933 longbeach EQ. the earthquake happened on march 10th at 5:55 pm PST they sussposedly went searching on the 9th of march and found the boat near dark. meaning if they went back the next morning after not being able to reach the longboat in question they could have reached the boat because the earthquake didnt happen until that night.

this story stinks of something sorry fellas.

 

[Real de Tayopa Tropical Tramp]

J could Mike ----

 

[motel6.5]

Gollum, I could not find the imformation on the searcher who found the Vikeing shield/sword. However I do believe Botts story on seeing the ship. Off subject, I read a tale about a hidden room inside the Batt cave,entered by a doorway. However I can"t find that source either. If true the doorway might be covered by batt guano. Like the interent links just disappered.

 

[austin]

Really interesting, but still just a legend. Some things make a lot of sense. The earthquake timeline doesn't matter. Major quake may have happened at 10:00 p.m., but smaller quake or earth movement could have taken place before that. Experienced that myself. My only question is how a ship got there, much less how it sailed that far to begin with. But open mind because anything is possible.

 

[motel6.5]

A tornando could have picked the boat up and dropped it their, just like in the movie Shark Tornando.

 

[Real de Tayopa Tropical Tramp]

Water level certainly couldn't.

 

[gollum]

A tornando could have picked the boat up and dropped it their, just like in the movie Shark Tornando.

You mean "SHARKNADO"! Sharknado II (The Second One) and Sharknado III (OH HELL NO!) are currently on Netflix.

Mike

 

[sdcfia]

MK Davis has a couple interesting videos on the Lovelock Giants and the apparent removal of their skulls from the museum there. Here's the first one.

 

[motel6.5]

Interesting viedo"s, there was an show on space Aliens couple years ago, the host went to the Lovelock museum, and he was shown the skulls of supposed red haired giants in a locked cabinet,also shown on same tv show. I also heard story of Giant skeleton/"s found on a Indian reservation,from a Piuete Indian in Nevada...Other story I heard involved findeing of Spanish treasure on Moapa reservatiion.

 

[Oroblanco]

Water level certainly couldn't.

I must respectfully disagree on that point pard, the gulf of California gets some wicked tidal bores, and the Colorado river has periodically broken out of its channel, flooding the Salton basin even in historic period. A ship could be carried up by a powerful tidal bore, or simply sailed up the river during one of those periods when it was flooding the Salton sink, and ended up trapped there. But technically you are right, the sea has not been directly connected to the sink for a very long time.

 

[Hitndahed]

I must respectfully disagree on that point pard, the gulf of California gets some wicked tidal bores, and the Colorado river has periodically broken out of its channel, flooding the Salton basin even in historic period. A ship could be carried up by a powerful tidal bore, or simply sailed up the river during one of those periods when it was flooding the Salton sink, and ended up trapped there. But technically you are right, the sea has not been directly connected to the sink for a very long time.

=================================================
I remember reading an article LONG AGO that the desert in the Salton Sea area was at one time connected to the "ocean".
And that a galleon had became "landlocked".
The Viking longboat story I do believe as well.
Time has a wonderful way of making strange things occur.

 

[Shortfinger]

Water level certainly couldn't.

Unfortunately, Don Jose, I have to agree with Oro on this one. Depending on the location, it is certainly possible that the edges and canyons of some of the mountains around the Salton Basin were close enough to the water some time during the Viking era to allow for the possibility that the ship could have been moved into the canyon, either by an extremely high water level, or by the Vikings, since their ships were commonly pulled up on shore, and occasionally portaged.

JB

 

[stefen]

A tornando could have picked the boat up and dropped it their, just like in the movie Shark Tornando.

There are tornado-like funnels along the California coast often referred to as Micro-Bursts...

However there are no tornado's (or hurricanes) inland in the shadow of the mountain range...there are Santa Ana winds, but again not in this region.

 

[Kauziamos]

Damn it Mike! Reading the thread title and date, I thought maybe you had been poking around in anzo borrego again and actual re-found it! Man, wouldn't that be something...Has anybody got any theories as to how a ship's bow would be sticking out of a cliffside? Are we to assume that the rest of the ship is encased in the cliff as well, or that perhaps just the bow somehow ended up lodged/wedged up there?....and that shield-I read it made for a good tortilla pan or some such

 

[Ryano]

Mammoth bones were routinely identified as "giant" bones before modern paleontology. Red hair isn't an exclusive Viking gene either.

 

[Isayhello2u]

There are tornado-like funnels along the California coast often referred to as Micro-Bursts...

However there are no tornado's (or hurricanes) inland in the shadow of the mountain range...there are Santa Ana winds, but again not in this region.

um i think they do occur just as a rare event. weather reports from the area only go back about 100 years. in a way weather reports do not go back even that far as there was really no one in the area consistently making reports on the weather until the newspapers started. You live in an area for many years and you start to think that because the weather has always been the way you experienced it that is the way it always is and was. But that just is not true. As an example experts in historical weather tell us that there was a little ice age event between the 1400s and the 1800s that caused a drought in the area. Presumably the area could have been wetter in the Viking era.
there was a desert tornado in 2015 admittedly not in the shadow of that side of the mountain range but still not all that far away as storms go.
[Pics and Video] A Tornado Hit Desert Center Tuesday!! - Cactus Hugs