A three-hour intensive clean-up of the rocky, shingled foreshore between Perfume Point in Ahuriri and the Port of Napier on Saturday left organisers looking for a trailer.
A big trailer.
Members of the national group Sustainable Coastlines, joined by more than a dozen enthusiastic locals, picked up an estimated 1650 litres ofrubbish - much of it environmentally stifling plastic.
"It was a big trailer load," the organisation's co-founder, Sam Judd, said yesterday.
While dismayed at the litter that had been washed ashore and dropped there, he was delighted at the success of the clean-up which began at 9am, despite grey skies and drizzle turning to steady rain.
As well as support from locals, and the approval of the Napier City Council, Sustainable Coastlines had received support from Loop Recordings and the Fly My Pretties Summer Showcase at Black Barn.
It was all about cleaning the coastlines and making people aware, Mr Judd said.
"It was great. Despite the weather, which would have kept some away, we still had people coming down to join in ... one lady had her six-year-old with her."
Even local businesses joined in, with Ahuriri cafe restaurant Milk and Honey providing hot drinks and muffins for the volunteers who dragged heavy-duty large bags across the rocks and foreshore gathering up flotsam and jetsam.
Plastics bottles, bags, strips of rope and nylon, cans, glass bottles and slabs of polystyrene were collected.
"It was a great effort and no one cared about the weather. We storm-trooped it, mate," Mr Judd said.
One volunteer was Aucklander Alex Asher who is on a 10-week mission to run the eastern seaboard of the North Island from Cape Reinga to Wellington to raise awareness about protecting coastlines.
"He had a day off from running so joined in," Mr Judd said.
