Ohhh the trails….how amazing are our local trails?

Well, if you have been looking for a place that has magnificent outdoor scenery, some decent hills and technical routes, then Warburton is for you! This year, Chris Ord and the teams from Tour de Trails and Salomon put an excellent adventure packed weekend for all to enjoy! With events coming from ultra distances, such as the 50km Lumberjack Ultra, to more beginners’ friendly formats as the Body Positive Stomp and different shorter trail distances, Warby Trail Fest is clearly for everyone!

And the festival couldn’t stay behind! We had a super plogging session on Sunday the 10th of March! With the collaboration of Salomon and Tour de Trails teams, we plogged through the surroundings of the Upper Yarra River. It was such a fantastic experience for all of us to be able to share our love for the trails with the local community and trail family.

The results were shocking but rewarding, as you would never expect the level of rubbish found in beautiful places like this. After about 40 minutes, our plogcrew was able to rescue a total amount of 27 KILOS! YES! 27 KILOS OF MIXED LITTER!

Getting numbers like this in such a short time gives me two thoughts to reflex on:

1. How did we get to this point?

2. How people working together can create such a positive impact.

So far, the events have been an excellent tool to show people how our natural spaces, which we believe are pristine and clean, have been affected by everyday life litter. This creation and increase of awareness around the pollution problem (particularly single-use plastics) is how you can create change on a long-term basis. We have heard so many amazing things from our volunteers, like how they have swapped to the Keepcups, reusable straws, composting, and much more. I have to even admit to myself that a few years back, I didn’t have a clue of how bad this whole situation was. I was living like a simple mortal using disposable cups (that I believed were recyclable, or just mere paper), not seeing the impacts of the things I was using and just not doing enough. Why? I just didn’t know any better, and at that time was rare to see much litter around to be honest (or at least my eye wasn’t trained enough).

Since I started actively collecting litter (during diving, running, walking, travelling, you name it), I made that connection that brought me to what I call my “let’s create less crap and give back” journey. I’ll write more about this, but back to the Warby Trail Fest: I am soooo freaking happy that trail organisations are looking to create a good impact in their local trails! And this couldn’t have been possible without our folks from Salomon and Tour de Trails, so big kudos to them!

We had so many great volunteers that plogged with us, even after running that “nasty” beautiful Donna Double course (nasty for your calves but good for the heart haha). So, I could say “Thank you” in 24 languages and still be short of how grateful we were about the incredible participation from all of them. And omg… I have to say that those mini ploggers are my hope for a better world tomorrow, and their parents are really parenting like legends, teaching values that are so important these days, like looking after the place where you live and giving a good example!

As a summary, we had an unforgettable weekend! We camped, volunteered in aid stations, plogged, swept the night run, met new and old friends, listened to Jacqui Bell, and just had the best weekend ever. And no, this is not me trying to sell Warby haha but you better get your tickets for next year, we will be there plogging and having the best fun again!

Cheers!

Karin