Unless we’re mistaken, we are the ONLY Coastal Clean Up Day site that Sierra Club captains in the whole state of California (national staff are you listening?). We’d love to get knocked off the throne, but in the meantime…a half ton of trash will NOT waste our beach and NOT increase the Pacific garbage patch because of our amazing volunteers. “I have always wanted to come and see this natural area,” one person told organizer Nina Danza, “and this is the perfect time to come and do something to help.”

Sierra Linda School teacher Charlene Bouvet brought a crew for the 6^th year in a row, in fact, that’s every year we’ve run the Santa Clara River Gateway site. “Water is an extremely important topic in our class,” explained Ms. Bouvet, “this year we are doing a water walk demonstration learning about what it takes to obtain water in developing countries.” Her crew took on the task of tallying the trash counts at the end of the clean up, a long and hard duty. 

All work and no play? NOT! Almost all the volunteers wanted to go on a river tour with Jim Danza, chair Friends of the Santa Clara River, to ‘find out why we are at this particular place today’. “The beaches are getting a load of micro-trash removed, but inland sites are the source of that micro-trash and may be more important to take care of,” suggested Jim. He pointed out how the river floor material is critical for transfer of flow from surface to groundwater and where the 101+ year storms might flood (yes, over the man made river side walls onto the street).  

Always a crowd favorite, the Most Unusual Thing contest entries ranged from: a flat screen TV, a broken down couch, a graduation gown complete with a study book, a No Parking sign, a bike in 8 different pieces, and some platform shoes. Who won? Everyone, the community, the river and the health of our environment.