Earth Day Part Three: The Action

Photo: The Telegraph

Happy Earth Day Everyone!

 (Yes, I realise it was yesterday, but humour me.)

If you follow my Instagram, I'm sure you'll have seen I had something of a productive day. Well, here is all the behind the scenes gossip, my what went wells, what I'm going to do next time (yes, next time) and some of the weirder things we picked up.

The Beach: Colwyn Bay, Wales.

MORNING

We started early, aimed to get to Colwyn Bay for about 10am. Through some miracle, we kept to that plan. I'm normally half an hour after the time I guestimate we should be at places for. It's an easy drive though: up to Chester, across to Wales. Literally two roads. And with my sea-themed CD, it felt like no time at all. Parking was a little problematic, there were roadworks happening where the internet said the car park was. But with it being Sunday, we found somewhere better and free.

Getting to the promenade and beach was simple, we were at the seafront within minutes. Taking a good noseful of the salty air. Cue one happy mermaid. As I'm sure you noticed, the weather has been glorious this week. Not so much Sunday.

Colwyn Bay @ 10am

Typical British weather was not going to stop me though. I did winge I was cold though, for I am only human. I mean, I am only mermaid.

We started on a quiter section of the beach. The sand was wet and solid, rather than that typical beach sand you get on the more tourist-y beaches. This was a good thing as I realised half way to Chester that not only I had I forgot my wellies, I had also forgotten my sandals. I did this beach clean in my lovely new Mantaray boots. They survived, they are just a little sandy now!

This bit of the beach had two stoney dykes, which gave us a natural starting section. We walked down the closest, walked the shore to the further one, traversed the second then came back along the tide wall. Peachy. This took us two hours. I was expecting lots of trash - litter, coffee cups, cigarette butts. What we found was more industrial and long abandoned cans. Some were completely full of sand and even had evidence of things having lived there. Dr Ian Malcolm said it best, life finds a way!

The rocky dykes were where most of the rubbish was - all wedged in, good and proper. There were a few things we had to cut out and, worse, a few things we had to leave behind. Thankfully, one of us was sensible enough to bring a knife along! But the things we struggled with have given us the knowledge on what to do better next time. This trip was a steep learning curve, and I'm glad it was just the two of us. Next time, I'll have a better idea of what I need to do.

Naturally, I took my shoes off and waded into the cold water. There was some particularly dangerous rubbish - sharp wires and glass - and it needed to go. I did find a mermaid purse in the water though, so it wasn't all bad. We also saw several crab limbs and a few critters.

Crab pincer

Mermaid purse

This net was buried in the sand

In those two hours, we filled two bags. We felt like we had acomplished our mission.

AFTERNOON
We dropped the bags off at the car. We decided to have an amble through town and have a bite to eat after a job well done. There was a 1940s festival on in town, which we had a look around. There was live music and people dressed in 40s attire. It was a little under populated, but I think everyone would have visited during Saturday's fairer weather. Still, it was nice to watch them mill about while drinking a coffee.

Naturally, we were playing Pokémon Go. There was a new Pokémon a little way out of the town centre, so we went to get it. This lead to another walk across the beach. We found the more popular beach. Fine sands, picnic areas, statues. And, more rubbish. We had one bag left, so we figured we may as well pick up what we found on the way.

Fifteen minutes later and the bag was full. There was rubbish everywhere. This is more of what I was expecting: lolly wrappers, cigarette butts, takeaway trays. What I wasn't expecting was the Easter egg box! It was clear to see that the beach had been packed the day before. There was also an obscene amount of baby wipes partially buried in the sand. As someone who works in hospitality, I can safely say: No one wants to throw away someone else's used baby wipe. It's bad enough when they are left on plates, let alone when I have to dig them out of the ground! Thank goodness for gloves!

Fifteen minutes into the second clean of the day

(Oh, we got the new Pokémon, by the way.)

We strolled back to our starting point to have the rest of our picnic. By this time the tide was coming in pretty quickly. We sat at a high point to eat our food, and still got surrounded!

Genuinely took about twenty minutes to surround us!

THINGS I'VE LEARNED FOR NEXT TIME

• Wear better shoes. As much as I love walking barefoot on the sand, I did step on something which cut my foot. Not badly, but not ideal in any case. I feel sand shoes will be best.
• Bring a sharper knife. Ours did the job, but something more robust will serve us better.
• Stronger and more bags. I just grabbed the first bags I found in the kitchen cupboard. They were not particularly environmentally friendly or sturdy. Several things poked their way through the bags and we had to stop filling at least one because it was getting too heavy to hold its contents.
• A base camp. We needed somewhere to put the full and heavy bags, without trudging back and forth from the car each time. I felt like we couldn't just leave them unattended or unidentified, in case a curious dog went sniffing through or something. I was thinking a board with Mermaid Beach Clean written on it - fully brand the event.
• Bring a few more friends! We'd get a lot more done, have more hands to move the heavy stuff, and it'd make it more of a day. If you are interested in joining me next time, drop me a message! All my contact info is on the contact page.

WEIRD FINDS

• Condom wrapper
• Full can of Kopperberg 
• A pair of knickers!
• A jumper and a towel.
• Half a shoe.
• Ship hooks.
• And more socks than you could shake a stick at.