The couple hope their photos will educate their fanbase on plastic and pollution. Photo / Instagram, Marie Fe and Jake Snow
The couple hope their photos will educate their fanbase on plastic and pollution. Photo / Instagram, Marie Fe and Jake Snow
It's one of Indonesia's most popular spots to take a swim and, of course, snap a selfie.
But the growing fame of the pink sand and turquoise waters of Komodo National Park has meant the once tranquil swimming spot has turned into a rubbish dump — thanks to its growingpopularity.
Travel bloggers Marie Fe and Jake Snow, who have more than 478,000 followers, posted two photos of the enticing location taken a year apart to their Instagram account.
"2018 PINK BEACH to 2019 PLASTIC BEACH" the caption reads.
On the same spot, a year apart: Pink beach covered in plastic. Photo / Instagram, Marie Fe and Jake Snow
"This is the reality of the horrible situation we find ourselves in," the post read.
"Even the most secluded and untouched beauties of the world like this Pink Beach in the Komodo Islands are being drowned in plastic!
"We never imagined that upon return to our favourite beach in the world we would find such a disturbing scene! It really broke our hearts to see the amount of rubbish that had washed up on this once beautiful beach."
The post has received more than 53,000 likes and has been dubbed #plasticparadise, with thousands of comments about the tragedy of the comparison.
"This beach was pretty hard to see, so beautiful but so trashed," one person wrote.
"Amazing and horrific post at the same time! We just cleaned up plastic on the WA coast this weekend and were so dismayed to see the sheer volume of trash out there."
Every year, up to 15 million tonnes of plastic waste is estimated to make its way into the ocean through coastlines (about 12.5 million tonnes) and rivers (about 2.5 million tonnes). This amount is expected to double by 2025.
