week 11 Danielle & Family at Oceanic--lots of straws and butts

Hey Ginger!

We did back to back 20 minute clean ups at Access 36 on Sunday and Monday.  As you know, our family adopted access 36 and tend to go there quite often.  One thing that we find at access 36 is a lot of restaurant litter from Oceanic.  The litter can be found on the north side of the pier and includes lots of straws, papers, crayons, cracker wrappers, plastic condiment cups, etc.  One of the major problems, as you've noted before is the straws.  On Sunday, we picked up a total of 36 straws.  29 of those straws came from Oceanic.  On Monday, I picked up 21 straws... 16 from Oceanic.  Clear straws, some still in paper and also the little black "stirrer" straws.  If anyone wonders...yes, it's obvious that they come from Oceanic's dining pier as there is a whole line/section where they can be found... sometimes they blow into the grasses as well.

Another thing that is always a problem when cleaning up at access 36 is the amount of cigarettes left in the employee break area.  On Sunday, I was so frustrated that I skipped cleaning up the employee break area.  But, when we came back on Monday... the "break area" was in the same dismal state.  In just that one area, I removed 99 cigarette butts.  What makes me very bothered by that is that if the employees are smoking during their break and littering their cigarette butts... I have no doubts that they are littering them in other places as well.  Oceanic has an opportunity to educate about the negative impacts that cigarette litter has on our environment... and just like the straws... they need to take full responsibility and fix the problem.  Wrightsville Beach is their home... their backyard... they should cherish it.  I am going to contact them again, but I think that it would make more of an impression on Oceanic if many more people contacted them as well.

Also, Monday evening the trashcan was overflowing.  Looking down the access (to the north) there were a lot of trashcans spread out... most completely empty.   There really needs to be more trashcans at the access point as that's where the majority of people are coming and going.

Here are the links to my blogposts... they're a bit ranty from my frustrations of cleaning up after Oceanic.

Our Daily Ocean: Day 78
Our Daily Ocean: Day 79


Totals:

Cigarette butts: 544
Straws: 57
Plastic spoons: 2
Caps: 16
Toys: 3

Danielle