Captain’s Log: Entry
118, August 28, 2007
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Today was the first ever environmental
awareness day in El Astillero. The two day event started
with a mass trash cleanup of the beach and roadside. Over
300 school kids participated along with local community
leaders, MARENA (Nicaraguan environmental agency), the
Alcaldia de Tola, and Team Surfari. It was pouring down
rain for the trash cleanup, but that did not stop everyone
from cleaning up hundreds of bags of trash. On the second
day of the event, the school organized a march down the
street of Astillero and then held a two hour presentation
at the school. The presentation included speeches from the
Mayor, skits by the kids, local dances, and a puppet show.
All of the presentations were aimed at teaching the kids
the importance of keeping their beach and town clean to
protect the environment. El Astillero is located right
next to the Chacocente Wildlife Refuge that is one of only
7 places in the world that marine turtles will come by the
tens of thousands in a single night to lay their eggs. The
kids were taught the importance of not throwing plastic
bags on the ground that will undoubtedly end up getting
eaten by turtles once the offshore wind blows them into
the ocean. Team Surfari also presented three surfboards to
the Mayor and Doribel (Community leader in Astillero)
which will be used to start the “Surfers for a Clean
Astillero” program. The three boards will be kept at the
local fish co-op and will be available for rental to any
kid that brings in a 55 gallon bag of trash collected off
of the beach or roadside. If anyone is interested in
donating boards to the program, they can contact us at
surfaricharters@hotmail.com. The entire event was the
first of its kind, and we believe a very important step to
ensuring long term environmental protection of Nicaragua.
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