in the neighbourhood | Mama Cormier

….our most interesting finds

Over the last 30 days we’ve certainly come across a whole host of unusual finds in the parks, on the beaches and between the rocks.

Lake Ontario is part of the Great Lakes in North America and provides fresh drinking water to over 9 million people in Ontario, Canada and New York State, U.S.. It is the 14th largest fresh water lake in the world and because it is so deep it never freezes completely.

There are days when the waves are so large you would think you were on an ocean. I bring this up because much of the garbage that we collected from the beaches was washed ashore during those days when the swells were huge.

Some of things that we found on the beaches and between the rocks were golf balls, styrofoam and plastic, old tires, chair parts, umbrellas, headless doll and a wallet with $20.00.

When we started on this challenge May 2 we were wearing winter coats, hats and mitts and now five weeks later we’re in our shorts, tee-shirts and sandals. We always say that here in Toronto we go from winter right into summer.

….to clean all the parks in our neighbourhood

On May 4th I joined my neighbour Trish on her 30 Day Clean the Parks Challenge. As we come to the end of this experience we’ve learned a few things about people.

Most people are very appreciative for what we’re doing. We’ve met some wonderful people on this journey. It’s the minority that spoil our parks with trash they they can’t be bothered to walk over to the bins. In our parkette at the bottom of the street where we live there are three sets of bins space about 100 metres apart. The biggest offenders here are those people who drive down here to eat their breakfast, lunch and dinner in their cars and then dump their empty cups, food containers, serviettes, cigarette butts and beer bottles on the curb.