Mollie had to complete a trail cleanup project by midnight tonight and it cleared up just long enough for us to get it done. We left my place at 1530 and drove over to Mount Vernon. Mollie started the cleanup at the parking lot for the Mount Vernon Estate and we walked down the Mount Vernon Trail for about a mile. There wasn’t much to pick up near the path itself and I wondered if we would be able to finish the project in the area... I asked Mollie to follow me down a dirt trail we saw near Little Hunting Creek and - jackpot - we came across a huge amount of trash at a fishing hole we found on the shore of the Potomac. We were actually close to where we did a big river cleanup project last year and encountered the fields full of plastic bottles. This was just as bad - we found more garbage (mostly beer bottles and cans) than we could carry... For her class, Mollie was supposed to pick out 10 pieces of representative trash and sort them by type - we found plastic, aluminum, paper, clothing and biohazard. It was interesting to see that the bike trail got so much cleanup attention but the riverside didn’t. Even worse, though, was the realization that people have time to get outside right now but won’t pack out their messes. My thoughts turned to the image in that old commercial with the crying Native American... Before we were finished with our outing, we walked over to see G.W.’s flowers and horses (along with lots of pretty birds) - it was a bit lighter way to end the day (1645). Spring is definitely here!
