bucket

South Florida does have a redeeming quality: the ocean.

/ antonioyrocinante / Leave a comment

It is a well-known fact that South Florida is a suburban wasteland, with crazy development (Florida does not have income tax, so they compensate it with property tax, thus the constant building…). As you drive through South Florida it is golf course after residential development after shopping strips, again and again, for mile upon mile… However, there is one massive redeeming quality, yes you guessed it: the ocean.

I am privileged to live walking distance from the beach, and I try to go two or three times a week.

If it is my cardio day and the tide is low, I will go for a run on the beach. Alternatively, if it is my cardio day and the water conditions are good -something rare here, since there is usually rip tide warnings, Portuguese Man-O-War, chop, etc. etc.- I will go for an open water swim of about a mile.

On Sunday evenings, before yoga, I will go for a walk/meditation and with a big bucket, clean up the beach. The amount of trash one picks up is crazy, check out my report here.

At the beginning of the year a dear colleague took me Stand Up Paddling in the Intracoastal (read about it here), but recently we have been going out on the beach and actually surfing!! Although I have much to learn and I have only caught baby waves, it is great fun!!

In a very generous act. Fr. George gifted me the board I have been using recently, what an honor!

Finally, occasionally, I will just go for a walk on the beach, no bucket for picking up trash, no running, just a nice walk.

So, as much as I complain about Florida, I do love getting out on the water, or at least running next to it.

Stuff one finds on the beach.

/ antonioyrocinante / 1 Comment

As my faithful readers know, my community service this year was cleaning the beach every Sunday afternoon. It was extremely rewarding to help, and at the same time to walk for an hour and to meditate while enjoying the beautiful beach and weather. A three in one: community service, meditation, and exercise.

During the Winter months, the strong winds (I guess) blew in all kinds of trash, sometimes in the course of an hour I had to empty my big bucket (you know, the 5-gallon blue buckets) up to three times! Now in the warmer months there was remarkably less trash. Anyway, that was my highly scientific (not) guess.

Fortunately, I am not the only one on beach cleaning duty, I do bump occasionally into other people cleaning up. The town also has 4 buckets available at the entrance to the beach if you want to grab one and clean up.

On top of all that there is a bit of a treasure hunter thrill, and a fun component to what you find or might find. Here is an incomplete list of things I have found:

  • Bottle tops – this is the most popular trash on the beach ☹
  • Plastic forks and spoons – really people?
  • Bottles – mostly plastic but also glass. All sorts of bottles: drinks, shampoo, oil, you name it…
  • Bits of plastic – from tiny to huge and in all colors. You cannot even tell what they used to be a part of.
  • Flip flops – every Sunday at least one! Usually, barnacle incrusted.
  • Cigarette lighters
  • Deflated balloon
  • Hammerhead shark – dead
  • Comb – I picked it up, not because I needed it.
  • Eyeglasses – no glass and broken, but I do not need them.
  • Lure – with a massive hook I gave it to a dude fishing.
  • Dog Tag – Palm Beach.
  • Part of a propeller – someone surely missed it…
  • Etc. Etc.

Oh, and make sure you do not step on the Portuguese Man-O-War… or their deadly, long tentacles.