Traverse Area Paddle Club

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Trip Reports

August 12 Boardman cleanup

Published on 8/12/2010

We (Lois, Tracie, Tracie's son Gwinn and Cindy) spent the afternoon cleaning the Boardman from Shumsky to Beitner. We got 3 large bags of trash. It was 91 degrees, so no-one had any hesitation about jumping into the water to get old beer cans and bottles, plus a few shoes and chip bags. Doing a river cleanup on a hot day is the best!

One highlight of the trip was seeing Gwinn quickly learn the ins and outs of handling his boat in current. He picked up ferrying before we even left the launch area, and was doing eddy turns and peelouts like a pro within an hour. Youth is great, but then again, his mom has become quite an accomplished kayaker in the past couple of months.

Another highlight occurred when I found a dollar bill in the river.

After about two hours, I hopped out of my kayak to go after a beer bottle midstream, and was greeted by the guy who lives in a house just across the river. His name is David McCool (http://www.mccooloutdoor.com/bio_davidmccool.php), and he offered to take all the trash we had accumulated by that point. He fell all over himself thanking us for cleaning "his" river. Turns out that he is the founder of the Boardman River Project, and he asked to be a part of any future cleanup trips we have on the Boardman. His dog Fisher was also quite charming and so were his chickens.

Here we are at the end of the day.

Lois

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