TU River Cleanup And Some Rainy Float Tubing

As part of the city wide clean up day, our recently reformed local TU chapter worked on cleaning up the river this morning. We were but a small cog in a large effort consisting of volunteers from many different organizations and private citizens just wanting to be involved. Our small group did quite a number on some sections of river pulling out any trash we saw as well as removing old tires from the river. The rather reassuring thing was that most of the trash seemed quite old or dated and the tires we pulled were obviously quite old too. Perhaps people are showing the greenbelt a bit more respect the last few years. The other thing is that maybe much of the new trash gets blown out every year in runoff. I don't know what the case is but it was quite a morning and we felt as if we accomplished a little something in the grand scheme of recovering and restoring the river over the next few years.

Dumpster with one of the truck tires we yanked from the river

After the cleanup I went to the lunch for volunteers and had a nice time chatting with others over a burger and coke. We had such pleasant weather for the morning it made the cleanup easier on everyone participating.

Wanting to take advantage of the weather, I went home and outfitted the float tube for a stillwater trip. Upon arrival at the lake, the storm clouds had rolled in and by the time I launched the tube, it started to rain.

I spent two hours in the cold rain before it finally let up and after the storm I managed to get into a few rainbows.

Most of my time on the water I was watching a loon that had decided to stop over in the valley.

With the action not red hot I began to make my way to the end of the lake with plans to load up and leave. I managed one last rainbow which ended up being the best fish of the day and departed with plans to return on Sunday.