British Couple Might Get Rich Off Whale Vomit

This weird, stinky lump found on a British beach might
be worth as much as $70,000  

A couple in Lancashire found something foul smelling on the beach, and could make quite a monetary windfall because of it.

Gary and Angela Williams were walking along a fairly remote stretch of beach when they found a piece of something known as ambergris, reports The Guardian. 

It's kinda of, sort of whale vomit. It comes out of bile ducts and intestines of sperm whales when they've eaten something sharp and hard and need help passing the difficult food.

Luckily, the Williams had read about ambergris, so suspected right away they'd found a rugby ball sized lump of it. They wrapped it in a scarf and took it home.

When it's found, ambergris stinks "It's a very distinctive smell, like a cross between squid and farmyard manure," Gary Williams told the Guardian.  

Oddly, because of the smell, you'd think the perfume industry wouldn't be interested in such a thing. But they are, big time.

Perfumers uses this stuff to make scents, presumably pleasant ones, last longer. Ambergris is rare, so people get into bidding wars to obtain the stuff.

The lump the Williams found might be worth as much as $70,000.

Which has Gary Williams very happy. "If it's worth a lot of money, it will go a long way towards buying us a static caravan. It would be a dream come true."

(For you non-British readers, a static caravan is a mobile home.)

I hope that nice couple in Britain, then, have fun with the potential bidding war.