Coastal Cleanup - El Porto

Yesterday was my first volunteering experience with Heal the Bay's Coastal Cleanup Day. And this year my son, Campbell, was old enough to participate (well, sort of) and learn about the importance of cleaning up our beloved beaches. We headed out to El Porto, one of our regular hang-outs, bright and early to meet up with a volunteer team from Heal the Bay. We were given latex gloves, blue and green trash bags for trash and recyclables, and a score card for the trash we're to pick up (that's how they get their statistics for the 4,281,104 cigarette butts found on the beaches since 1985 when the first Coastal Cleanup began.) My son was psyched about our 'treasure hunt' for trash on the beach and was quick to point out every cigarette butt (and there were many!). We were instructed to focus on the smaller trash particles (the ones that do the most harm for sea animals), like small pieces of Styrofoam, plastic, and of course the infamous cig butts. I could easily assess that 99.9% of the trash we picked up was small particles of Styrofoam and cigarette butts. If there was an effective band on beach smoking and Styrofoam use in restaurants our trash bags would have been empty!

Overall it was a great introduction to our 3-year old on the importance of picking up after ourselves to keep our beaches pristine and we all felt we did our part, however small, to help clean up the environment - literally one cigarette butt at a time. My family and I were especially excited about cleaning up El Porto, our favorite family/surfing beach in the South Bay area. The gentle waves are perfect for toddlers, the waves are usually friendly for beginner surfers like myself (and if not, the waves are great for body boarding), and we LOVE the smoothies and breakfast burritos at the beach snack bar (highly recommended!!)

So next year, try to do your part and get involved with your local Coastal Cleanup event. They're all over the country now (and in 91 countries around the world), and not just at beaches anymore. This year was the first big effort for Heal the Bay to create awareness inland and get the trash from the source before it hits the ocean (via storm drains) with cleanup outposts at inland spots (e.g. Compton Creek)

My only criticism of the event was the lack of awareness. I only really knew about the event because I'm a member of Heal the Bay, but the word of mouth and advertisement of the event could use a little more oomph. One surfer on the beach was totally clueless of the event and asked us what we were looking for when we were scavengering along the beach. Hello! Ever heard of Coastal Cleanup Day? Apparently not. So let's hope next year we'll have an even bigger turnout and more people (surfers and inland dwellers alike) will know about this universal event and take part to preserve our oceans.