Anja was walking her dog "Silverfox" on the beach one Sunday afternoon, it was the school holidays and she just loved walking her dog on the beach. She noticed a ship sailing past, but took no notice of it and carried on playing with her dog, throwing the ball for him. However, this was going to be like no other day on the beach, as she was just about to find out. Silverfox, suddenly stopped dead in his tracks and had a weird look on his face, Anja wondered was going on until she heard shouts behind her. She spun around and saw pirates, I mean a whole ship's crew of pirates running up the beach.

"Girl where is the inn?" bellowed one of the pirates. Anja pointed up the hill and off they went, 10 minutes later they were back and the captain said "you and your dog need to come with us and help us find the treasure we seek." Anja thought for a moment, giggled and thought "this is going to be a fun Sunday." "See captain, I told you, the world has changed since we have been away." Said one of the other pirates. "Quiet fool, otherwise you will be walking the plank again. Anja could do no more than giggle, "ssh girl this is serious," said the captain. "Of course,"  replied Anja, laughing even more.

 

 

 

Anja told the captain that she might know where the treasure was buried, so the captain and first mate followed her, it was funny seeing people's faces as she walked along with the two pirates, closely followed by the rest of the pirates. She took them to her house and took them to her back garden and pointed to the place, where her dad was going to dig out the foundations for an extension to the house. The first mate said "Look captain, it's even marked out on the ground where the treasure is." The captain was not sure, but ordered his men to dig. "How deep is the treasure girl?" bellowed the captain, "oh as tall as you captain sir," she replied giggling.

 

 

After digging for 2 hours, the crew were really tired, however, Anja was really happy and the captain had finally worked out, what Anja was up to. "Girl, these marks on the ground, are they markings for where a building should go?" Said the captain, "erm maybe", replied Anja giggling. "You have no idea where the treasure is, do you?" Bellowed the captain, "well, not exactly", replied Anja. With that he ordered his crew to follow him and were last seen hurrying down the road, towards town.

 

 

Anja went back to the beach to see if the pirates ship was still there, but she was horrified to find not one pirate ship, but 3 ships. As she looked all along the beach, she could see pirates looking around the beach and then moving in land, she wondered how many more ships there were and even more worrying, how many more pirates.

 

 

She had to come up with a plan to get rid of these pirates, no good was going to come of armed pirates roaming around the town. The pirates were not complete idiots and they know this stretch of land is were the treasure is, so they simply won't just go away, not until they have searched everywhere and either found the treasure or exhausted every hiding place.

 

 

After thinking for a while, she came up with a plan and started to walk towards town, when she came across another captain with his crew. This is getting serious, thought Anja to herself, she really needed to sort this out. "The other captain who landed first, told me, he is not going to share the treasure, with any other ship, he is going to keep it for him and his crew," said Anja. "Oh really, we will see about that." With that he turned, shouted for his crew and started off to town.

 

 

For 3 days and nights the pirates looked everywhere for the treasure, they could be seen, even late at night, scouring the streets and derelict buildings to discover the entrance, which would lead them to the treasure. On day one, a ship was sent to fetch the oldest surviving pirate, who knew the story about the treasure, but while they were waiting for him, they continued to search.

 

  

 

As time went on, while they waited for the old pirate to arrive, the pirates became desperate and were searching anywhere and Anja decided to have fun with one of the captains and asked, had he searched the pond. "Pond, who would put treasure in a pond?" Bellowed the captain. "Why not, it's a great hiding place, no one would think of looking there." Replied Anja. "Show me where this pond is." Bellowed again the captain. Once they got to the pond, the captain did no more than wadded in, Anja admitted to herself, how silly he looked.

 

 

That night, the old pirate arrived and he sat down with the captains and told them the story as he knew it. The pirates were being chased by Spaniards and decided they needed to hide the treasure. They discovered a hidden cave, which could only be accessed by the sea, when they entered the cave, they noticed a tunnel, a very long tunnel. They discovered at the end of the tunnel, a hidden cave, where they hid the treasure, one of the pirates walked further on and discovered a heavy stone door, with a secret lever. When he pulled the lever down, the door opened and it opened out behind the altar in a church. The captain's knew from the description of the church where it was and did no more and gathered up their men and descended on the church.

 

 

When they entered the church, they went straight behind the altar and found the secret lever and entered the secret cave. They walked down the make shift stairs and there in the secret cave was the treasure. So much gold and jewels, the pirates went crazy, dancing all over the place. The captains ordered them to stop and to start moving the gold up the stairs. Two pirates were sent off to find 2 wagons with horses and 30 minutes later returned with them and the pirates began to load the wagons. It took 3 journeys to move all the treasure to the sea, where the ships were waiting.

 

 

That evening, the captain loaded the ships one at the time with the treasure, once loaded they sailed out to sea and waited for the loading to finish. The captain was delighted that they finally found the treasure, he called Anja over and said "thank you young lady for helping us find the treasure and as a reward here is a bag of gold." Anja looked in the bag and it was full of gold coins, she was just about to say she couldn't accept it, when she remember her school was raising funds for a new building and this gold would go a long way in raising those funds.

 

 

Anja went to school, with her brother and sister, she didn't tell them about the gold in her bag. When no one was looking she crept quietly into the principal's office and placed the gold on his desk. 20 minutes later in the playground, where they had their daily meeting, their principal said "whoever left the gold in my office, thank you so much, it will help the school greatly." "oh my, it wasn't a dream, those pirates were real and so was that gold," thought Anja to herself. She was sure she could hear the pirates laughing in the background, she smiled and laughed too. It had been an amazing adventure and she wondered if the pirates would be back. Who knows.