BY
SAL MONTGOMERY
Bio
Sal is a regular contributor to the Paddler magazine and an outdoorsy type who is happiest when out adventuring with friends, although she does like the odd solo adventure too. When not on the river, she can usually be found playing on the sea or in the mountains. Watch her great video on Bhutan – a must watch @: https://uktvplay.uktv.co.uk/shows/expedition-with-steve-backshall/watch-online/6062262839001 and her interview in the Paddler magazine @: https://paddlerezine.com/an-interview-with-sal-montgomery/
What an eight days! The Ocean8Challenge
Now that World Oceans Day has passed and the Ocean8Challenge has been completed, we thought we’d check in with Sal to ask how it all went and what’s next!
Wow! What an eight days it’s been! Not only were we blessed with glorious sunshine every day, but we were also absolutely blown away by everyone’s support for the project! Despite the challenge being based in Cornwall, outdoors-lovers from all over the UK (and the world!) got in touch with messages of encouragement, as well as their own Ocean8Challenge stories! Beaches, rivers and parks around the country, plus Wales, Scotland, many parts of Europe, America, South America and even Australia, were covered!
During the challenge, we learnt a considerable amount about our waters and beaches. We’d expected to fill our buckets with primarily plastic bottles, polystyrene chip trays and broken inflatables, and although there was some of this, we had a few surprising discoveries!
One beautiful beach close to being completely rubbish-free had thin fishing wire tangled up in almost every piece of seaweed we found. The incredible She Swims Falmouth ladies didn’t hold back from crawling around and helping us to remove it, though! Another beach popular with tourists also seemed to have little rubbish until we found a small inland stream entering the beach – and bringing lots of tiny microplastics. Luckily, a birthday party of kids excitedly grabbed the litter-pickers and jumped in to help!
There definitely wasn’t any doom or gloom, though! Each day, ocean-lovers and local communities and organisations brought their smiles and enthusiasm and got stuck in! Even the Deputy Mayor got her marigolds on and joined the fun! The Ocean8Challenge was a fantastic way of meeting local people who are already doing their bit to help our oceans and encouraging others to get involved.
It just shows that no matter where we are or how small we think our contribution is, we can do amazing things when we work together! So, officially, the Ocean8Challenge has finished (until next time!), but why stop there?
Let’s pledge to return the favour and help look after the places we love. The places that enable us to do the things that make us feel awesome.
Shout outs
Huge thanks to everyone that got involved or got in touch during the challenge! And a big thank you to the Paddle Logger team that supported us throughout, both on and off the water! Let’s keep the good going and look out for the incredible places that we love!
