Antique Bottles

Antique bottles are truly a part of history. The different types of bottles tell a story about a particular industry or way of life. For example, medicinal bottles tell us how far the medical industry has come since many elements are now stored in plastic bags. Seeing an old glass IV bottle can take you back decades.
Benitoite

Benitoite was named after the county where it was first found, San Benito County, in 1907 and to this day San Benito County is the only place in the world that you can find this gemstone, making it among the rarest gems on the planet. Benitoite became California's official state gemstone in 1985. The price of this gemstone is between $500 and $3,000 per carat depending the quality of the stone and most of the gems found are less than one carat in size.
Fire Agate

The Opal Hill Fire Agate Mine is the only mine that I know of that allows the public to mine for fire agates. It is located in the the Mule Mountains not far from Palo Verde California. Normally when you think of a mine you think of a long tunnel you have to traverse deep into the mountain to find the mineral deposits. The Opal Hill mine is more of an open pit where you can spend $15 to stake your three foot square claim for the day.
Gold

The Roaring Camp Mining Company is in Pine Grove California, which is about one hour east of Sacramento. Visitors to the mining camp are shown many of the mining techniques us for locating gold. You are able to pan, sluice, dredge and dry wash for gold. You get to keep any gold that you find. Gold bearing material is collected from the mine bedrock area and run through a screening process to remove the large rocks and it is then made available to you.
Maps showing the location of gold finds are available on the internet. It is best to alway search in places that have found gold in the past. There still might be gold left "in them thar hills". Today treasure hunters primarly use portable metal detectors or gold-panning to prospect for gold.
Jade

Do you have a hankering to find some Jade but you do now want to travel to China or South America for it? Well you are in luck; you can just pick it off the ground from Jade Cove which is located about 65 miles south of Monterrey California.
Lobsters

Lobster hunting is becoming a favorite pastimes for many divers. These tasty crustaceans, also known as bugs to divers, are delicious. But in order to capture a lobster you must first find them. Lobsters need places to hide from other predators so prefer corral reefs, rocky area, old shipwrecks and man made areas where there are plenty of holes to hide in.
Meteorites

Treasures are falling from the sky. A natural object originating in outer space that survives the impact with the earth’s surface is called a meteorite. Most meteoroids burn up when entering the Earth's atmosphere. However, it has been estimated that over 500 meteorites do reach the surface each year and they will range in size of a marble to basketball size or larger. Only about five or six will be recovered each year and pound for pound, meteorites are move valuable than gold.
If you are lucky enough to have discovered a meteorite you could get about $4.00 a gram or $125.00 an ounce. Meteorites have been found all over the world but some of the best hunting places to start looking for them include deserts and dry lake beds. Known meteorite impact areas like Barringer Meteor Craterin in Arizona and Odessa Meteor Crater in Texas can also produce good results. Meteorites have also been found in California, Kansas, Illinois, Wisconsin, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Nevada.
Morel Mushrooms

Hunting for morel mushrooms typically runs from early April and runs through June depending on your geographical location. Moral mushrooms are found in small patches under dead or dying elms, ash, apple and even pine trees. The seem to like to hide under or near thickets or other plant small plants growing in the area but since the ground cover varies a lot each patch of mushrooms you come upon may be growing in totally different conditions. Typically the day time temperature around 60 to 70 degrees, night time temperatures not less than 40 degrees and the soil temperatures of about 50 to 60 degrees with good ground moisture levels are ideal for moral growing.
Black Truffles

Truffles are quite common in the Pacific Northwest Mountains from California through Oregon and Washington to British Colombia. They have also been reported to have been found in Idaho and Montana but these rumors have not been validated.
Tourmaline

The Himalaya Mine in San Diego County, California allows treasure hunters to search for tourmaline gemstones. For a fee of $75 the prospectors will have access to the mine tailings area all day long. Fill up your bucket from the mine and then take your potential treasures to the screening area and sift through the rubble for the gemstones.
The Himalaya Mine will also sell you a bucket of tailings to take home for $50 to $100, depending on the quality of tailings. You may also purchase a bag of “Pocket Mud” on the internet for $20 plus $10 for shipping, so you can screen at your leisure.
The underground mine consists of five miles of steep passages that were dug over the last 100 years so there is plenty of tailings you can sift through. If you decide to dig at the Himalaya Mine you will need to bring a shovel, bucket, gloves, hat and a ¼ inch screening stand.
Turquoise

Turquoise is usually found sandstone layers and can be seen as splotches or as a network of brown or black veins running through the sandstone. There are many small-scale mining operations that are worked by hand. Only one mine in Apache Canyon California operates at a commercial capacity today.
In California turquoise has been found in San Bernardino, Imperial, and Inyo counties.
Sunken Treasure

Real hunting for sunken treasure is not as fictional or fantastic as you might think. There are many scuba centers and guided tours that allow a tourist to scour some of the best sites where treasure might be found. And while many of these scuba centers are located in exotic places like off the coast of the Bahamas or in the Gulf of Mexico, some sunken treasure can be found in much more accessible areas such as off the coast of the Jersey shore and California.
Petrified Wood - petrified forest
Happy Treasure Hunting.