[meteorite-list] Republic of Palau / Coin

From: ted brattstrom <volcanoted_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Tue, 19 Dec 2006 17:05:19 -0800 (PST)
Message-ID: <20061220010519.37404.qmail_at_web53606.mail.yahoo.com>

Aloha - Alii

While I can't speak to the question of the meteorite coin showing up on the streets of Koror, I was able to purchase one of the 1990's colored coins in Koror (Capital of the Republic of Palau). They were not used as currency (US dollars were!) and they were only available in one place - memory escapes me, it may have been a national bank or ministry, it was not the Bank of Guam or Bank of Hawaii :-) Since the purchase price was in the $5-10 realm, it was really for the collector trade.

Palau is definitely a small country, with a small population, but with some of the best scuba diving in the world. Near the center of the whole Indo-Pacific system, there are about 1500 species of fish, and 400 species of coral. Water clarity is fairly good, and the wall/drift dives are quite spectacular, if a little giddy getting into the water 50 meters away from land, and 500+ meters deep!
The ultimate experience is snorkelling "Jellyfish Lake"

To go back to the meteorite theme - I doubt any old ones would be found there - it is uplifted coral for the most part, ancient reefs. Using a metal detector wouldn't help, as it was occupied before and during WW2 by Japan, and after by the US. There are lots of pieces of metal around :-) What isn't trivial to walk on is jungly and hot and humid, so I'm not holding my breath for a Palau meteorite.

Cheers - ted
who spend about 4 months in Palau in 3-4 trips

MexicoDoug <MexicoDoug at aim.com> wrote: Hello listees, Merry Christmas and happy holidays to everyone,

If you really want to keep abreast of the Palau coins, there is a quite
beautiful series I'd like to recommend. The particular 1993 kicked off the
series (well there was an uglier one in '92) with a sexy and nice outer
space conservation theme (a cool color coin):

http://www.numis-gallery.com/images/PALAU-93-NEW.jpg

Palau, a small country between the Philippines and Hawai'i with an area
smaller than Los Angeles has just over 20,000 inhabitants who depend
principally on tourism and subsistence agriculture. While the country is on the US dollar standard, I would be interested in knowing whether the $1 meteorite coins ever even passed through any of the Palau islands, or if they are the product of a continental entrepreneurial Asian mint gift shop?



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Received on Tue 19 Dec 2006 08:05:19 PM PST