The results of one morning’s haul from Sargeant Bay near Powell River, BC. Virginia Harris won an under-deck bag from Atlantis Kayaks for her entry in Wavelength’s Clean Up the Coast contest.

How dirty is our coastline? Plenty dirty, readers find

From the Winter 2010 issue of Coast&Kayak Magazine. Read the entire magazine online.

By Coast&Kayak Magazine

Virginia Harris doesn’t have to go far to find debris clogging the beaches. All it takes is a walk with her three dogs near her home in Halfmoon Bay near Desolation Sound to find loads of trash.

Kayak trips can be just as filthy.

“When I do get out on the water I end up coming back with a pile on the bow of my kayak consisting of plastic bags and other floating debris,” she wrote when entering Coast&Kayak Magazine’s Clean Up the Coast contest.

“We have a pristine beach here in a provincial park called Sargeant Bay. I walk there often. I usually end up finding a fair bit of garbage and I can’t help myself and start picking it up, filling bag after bag.”

She laid out one morning’s find on a tarp, then snapped a picture.

“I brought it home and laid it all out on a tarp (also found on the beach). As you can see there is an enormous amount of plastic. We have plastic fish farm feed bags, feminine product plastic applicators, Christmas light bulbs, balloons, Copenhagen tobacco tins, styrofoam (bits everywhere) you name it, it’s there on the beach.”

Virginia was one of the participants in Coast&Kayak Magazine’s Clean Up the Coast contest, which recognized participants in cleanup efforts from paddling clubs on Vancouver Island to Suwanee River clean-up participants in Florida.

The contest was held to recognize continuing efforts to clean our coast, plus to inspire people to pick up instead of passing by. Prizes in the contest included items from Klepper in Canada, Kokatat, North Water Paddlesports Equipment, Atlantis Kayaks, Seaward Kayaks, Solo Rescue Assist, Peregrine Kayaks, SeaSpecs, Kayak Kaboose, Peregrine Kayaks and Terracentric Coastal Adventures.

Not all participants stopped at simply collecting trash. Brad Atchinson has spent the last 42 years decommissioning hundreds of campsites, including their fire rings and scorched and scarred rocks.

“I am a NOLS graduate (1970s) and have been a proponent of minimum impact camping techniques, long before the Leave No Trace movement took root. In all likelihood, being a biologist and an environmentalist since the 1960s provide context for these cleanup efforts.”

Brad won a Kokatat Outercore Top for his efforts. Also winning was the Marine Sciences 10 class from St. Michael’s University School in Victoria, BC, for their beach cleanup efforts. They earned a model Aerius II from Klepper in Canada.