July 5 Pine cleanup Dobson to Peterson
Lois Goldstein | Published on 7/5/2023
We had 15 people on this trip, literally a cast of thousands. There were five people using rental canoes from PRPC, namely Mark, Wayne and Leslie, and John and Lois. We had five people using their free sit-on-top Twister kayaks, namely Maddy, Jake, Jacqui, Paul M and Irene. And then there were five people who brought their own boats: Jocelyn, Mike R, Kathleen, Roseanne and Henry.
Maddy is a Traverse City Central graduate, and has an an engineering degree from Michigan Tech; she now works in Minneapolis. Jake is her boyfriend. We are in the car heading home. So we will have quotes from everyone.
Here comes John:
I got more cans off the bottom of the river on this cleanup than I have on any other cleanup that we've ever done. And I was paddling a tandem canoe with my lovely wife, so I could never have gotten so many if she hadn't been directing the show. Note from Lois: this was the first time this season that we didn't have to wash our boats when we got home!
Here's Maddy:
Using a sit-on-top kayak was a different experience than a sit-in model. I had never been in that kind of kayak before and it was an awesome experience, getting to see the beautiful river and spend time with a great group of people.
Now we'll hear from Jacob:
My favorite part of today was finding a leather boot and using it to decorate in front of my kayak. All in all, it was a great day. Note from Lois: it was Jake who got all the mud out of the car tire, and then hoisted it into Mark's canoe. What a guy!
Photos by John and Jocelyn
Pictured left to right: Roseanne, Henry, Lois, John, Maddy, Jake, Jacqui, Mark, Jocelyn, Mike, Irene, Paul, Kathleen, Wayne, Leslie
Trying for a can that was deep in the river
Got it!
Jocelyn's find of the day - a metal insulated bottle in perfect shape!
John finds an empty V-8 juice can on the bottom of the river
Wayne and Leslie enjoying a ride through the riffles
Wayne finds a chair on the river bottom
Lois was happy to get into the cooling waters of the Pine River to get a can on the bottom of the river.
Roseanne was happy to get this broken glass beer bottle out of the river
Mark worked hard to get this car tire out of the river. It was so heavy he could not lift it into the canoe because it was filled with mud, so he asked us to use our canoe to push his boat into shallow water where others could get the mud out of the tire.
Paul (pictured) took the tire from Mark, and then Jake scooped the mud out of the tire with his hands. Once the tire was light enough to handle, he put it in Mark's canoe. At our lunch spot at High School Bridge, Mark unloaded the tire where his son Jake Miltner from Pine River Paddlesports Center could later pick it up. It takes a village to clean a river.
There was more than trash along the river
Our load of trash which doesn't include the stuff we dropped off at High School Bridge. Six or seven bags, plus a couple of chairs. The terrific team of L&W had already left. Thanks to Wayne for sharing walkie-talkie duties with me.
