This family lost their camera in Ireland. His baseball hat helped bring it home

Colby and Molly Patchin never expected to get their point-and-shoot camera back after it fell off the roof of their rental car in western Ireland earlier this month.

The Meridian couple and their 9-month-old daughter, Olivia, were on their way to the Cliffs of Moher, one of Ireland’s most popular tourist attractions, on Oct. 7 when they forgot the camera was on the car.

Later, when they discovered it missing, they figured it had fallen onto the side of Route 478 and was likely in some tall grass that would make it nearly impossible to find. The road was fairly narrow and Colby Patchin said he wouldn’t have felt safe walking along the road for what was probably an impossible task.

“We didn’t figure anyone would find it,” said Patchin, who owns Boise Pottery on North Orchard Street.

They left word at a nearby visitor center in case someone found the camera and brought it there but never heard anything. Until Tuesday night, when a photo of the family found on the camera was posted on Facebook and several people recognized Molly Patchin.

“Someone recognized the hat I was wearing as a Boise State hat and they ended up tagging the Boise State Broncos in the post and within a few hours, she had probably four or five text messages from her sister and friends and her brother-in-law saying they had seen it,” Colby Patchin said.

The most fortunate thing was that the camera was found at all. It was located a mile or two from the Cliffs of Moher, which flank the Atlantic Ocean.

“It was in a pretty remote area of Ireland and this gal just happened to be backpacking across Europe with a friend and they walked from this little port town where you take the boats to go see the Cliffs of Moher tour. They were walking from that town to the cliffs the next day and happened to see it in the grass along the side of the road,” Colby Patchin said. “It was actually quite a ways from the parking lot that we had left from.”

Luckily, the family had a larger digital SLR camera with them, so they were still able to take photos during the rest of their trip. But the smaller camera, used by Molly Patchin, had other photos from Ireland and from a trip they took earlier in the year at Niagara Falls down to Florida.

It may take another month before the woman who found the camera finishes her backpacking trip and is able to send the camera back. The Patchins are going to have her download the images first and send them electronically in case something happens to the camera in transit.

“That way, in case it gets lost in the mail, we still have the photos,” Colby Patchin said.

He said he’s thankful the woman worked to find the camera’s owner and glad he wore such a distinctive cap in the photo.

“I may have to start wearing hats more often, he said, laughing.

This story was originally published October 19, 2016 at 2:32 PM with the headline "This family lost their camera in Ireland. His baseball hat helped bring it home."