An Open Letter To All The BRCS-NCF Participants
Dear BRCS-NCF participants,
I tried to thank each of you for taking a day out of your Cherry Festival plans to work for the cleanliness of the Boardman River but in the confusion of keeping track of 7 canoes and all the associated equipment, I may have missed someone. So, here it is again.
Keeping 30 excited people in line isn't easy but you all really helped by being professional and courteous and doing a fantastic job helping me to lead this event for the Boardman.
This was the largest BRCS-NCF event ever, thanks to the 12-14 Coast Guard people (some with their kids in tow) that arrived ready to work and ready to help with canoes where they were needed. Canoes are an important part of this event and we can't do it without them.
Our four canoes and our trailer were donated this year to the BRCS by the American Canoe Association, LL Bean, The Darden Foundation (Red Lobster), Adams Chapter of Trout Unlimited and with the financial assistance of Dr. Steve Fred of Bethesda Maryland and the Bethlehem Lutheran Church Endowment Fund of Traverse City and Wicksall Distribtors. Thank you to all of these great organizations, businesses and individuals for your help. This equipment has been used three times so far this summer and will be used at least twice more for river cleanups this year.
Thanks to Mike Nelson at Jay's Sporting Goods in Clare, MI for making a special effort to get us the Old Town canoes at a great price and to Mark and Val Miltner of the Pine River Paddle Center for helping us get the trailer in a timely manner.
We love our canoes and trailer!
I hoped to not have to split the CG people up but it worked out ok. Kyle Young, as always, was a huge help organizing the "troops" and getting them to the venue on time and ready to go. The CG rocks. Thanks Mr. Young!
Our diver, Steve King, showed up a bit late but it was ok because our Holiday Inn shuttle ran a bit long and we all got started at the same time. He did a fabulous job of bringing up some really nasty trash out of the depths of the river. Steve, I hope you can be a "regular" for the BRCS-NCF in the future. It was fun for us having you there. I hope you had a good time, too. Thanks Steve!
The Traverse Area Paddle Club people in both sections helped keep everyone together and worked with their usual tenacity to clean the river. You volunteered to go where you were needed even though it meant, in some cases, not paddling with your friends. Thanks to all that volunteered to clean the pond even though you were expecting to paddle the river. We, being "river" people, know your sacrifice may seem small to others but it was much appreciated. Thanks John! Marv! and Marlene!
A special thanks to Pastor Paul and Tom Christensen for coming out to help us. Paul, we are going to make a paddler out of you if it kills us. But if it does, you can do the funeral. Thanks Paul and Tom!
Sally Brooks took some great pictures with a camera that she was not familiar with. Thanks Sally!
Frank Lahde ran the shuttle and helped for over an hour after the event with moving canoes and kayaks around on the cars and trailer and helping me carry a canoe up a very steep hill. Thanks Frank!
Thanks to Steve at the GT Conservation District who loaned us 2 additional canoes, 4 paddles, 4 long grabbers and a waterproof camera for the event and then came over to the storage barn to help me put them back into their regular storage locations. Thanks Steve Largent!
David Fred managed his pond group well by bringing special tools to do some special jobs and organized a swimming team to do some steel removal from the pond. I had hit that stuff last year with our power boat and I appreciate his and Kyle's tenacity in removing it. Good going guys! Our new radios worked really well by keeping David and me on the same schedule so we finished at the same time. Good idea to get the marine radios that work over a larger range. Thanks David!
And finally, a big thank you to the National Cherry Festival for allowing us to be included in their Community Share Program and for making a special effort on our behalf by removing the trash we leave at the two drop off points. We used to have to dispose of the trash ourselves and that was not easy. Thanks to Devin and all the people at the NCF office who do such a great job during Cherry Festival.
Thanks go out to AMERICAN RIVERS for donating 100 small trash bags and H. Cox and Son for donating 200 very large, tough "consolidation" trash bags. We will use these bags all summer for river cleanups.
All the pictures that I currently have are now in an online gallery and you can view them here:
http://www.brcleansweep.org/BRCS_NCF_12/
They have not been edited, so some are not so good but I will get them organized and put on the edited group on the BRCS website soon. Kyle, feel free to send them around to the CG troops along with my thanks.
When I look at these photos and think back on the day, I marvel that so many people thought enough of the environment to come together at one place to work so hard and get so dirty cleaning our beloved Boardman. Some people say, "Put your money where your mouth is." - but I say you put your bodies where your heart is.
You people are the REAL DEAL. There are none better!
Thanks again for coming and I hope to see you on the river again soon.
Norm