VOLUNTEER beach cleaners struck gold when they met up for the first group event at Maenporth Beach since February 2020, finding a wedding ring lost in the sand.

Not only did 30 cleaners pick up 16.9kg of rubbish from the beach, car park, lane and coastal paths, but one of the team also discovered the gold wedding ring lost by a man from Cardiff, writes Jane Leigh.

First-time volunteer Chris Duffin from Truro made the spectacular find on the beach. It turned out that a holiday maker had lost his wedding band at Maenporth seven days earlier but had fortunately reported it to the staff at Life’s a Beach Café.

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Café owner Leanne said: “The visitor had been devastated to lose his ring, so he was completely overwhelmed when we called him to say that the ring had been found, and that we’ll make sure he’s reunited with it.”

In addition to the ring, the cleaning crew from One Bag Beach Clean (OBbC), Plastic Free Falmouth and Plastic Free Helford River picked up bits of fishing net and rope, wet wipes, micro plastics, pieces of metal and a few cans and bottles, leaving the beach, car park, land and coastal paths looking much better.

The big collaborative clean up at Maenporth was a joint effort between Plastic Free Falmouth, Plastic Free Helford, Ocean 8 Challenge, One bag beach clean. The event was lead and organised by Carol at OBbC. It was capped to 30 people due to Covid, but was hugely successful collecting 16.9kg rubbish with lots of fishing line.

Plastic Free Falmouth are also looking for a beach clean coordinator to help them out with events - someone with a little time, transport and happy to get stuck in. All training is provided for what is partly an admin role doing the paperwork and then on the day of the clean up once a month coordinating volunteers with help from the group. The group is looking for maybe five hours a month commitment. Anyone interested can contact the group plasticfreefalmouth@hotmail.com