In this article, we wanted to give the floor to Martonio Paleka, who has owned and skippered a Lagoon 450 F for 15 years. He chose this model mainly for its size. For him, it is a perfect catamaran to be handled by a single skipper, while providing maximum comfort, even with 8 people on board!
“After one season, the Lagoon 450 F had proved itself to be the ideal choice, all my guests loved it and my family enjoys it whenever the boat is available” – the catamaran is available for charter.
Back in September, Martonio headed off on a Mediterranean cruise with a group of young French people aboard his Lagoon named MARLA. Their plan was to sail to the Croatian islands (Vis, Bisevo and Svetac).
On the way, something clicked! While the crew wanted simply to enjoy their lunch stop in a quiet bay… there was a (nasty) surprise in store! They were faced with the sad realization that the beach was filled with trash.“My guests and I immediately agreed to go clean up the area.”
It should be noted that every year the Mediterranean Sea and its scenery that features in the most successful movies attract thousands of tourists. However, this sea is one of the most polluted in the world. This is why the crew took action!
After several hours of cleaning, they’d collected more than 110lbs (50 kg) of cans and plastic bottles. They stored the pile of waste in their dinghy so that they could then dispose of it properly when they got ashore, thanks to the help of the town of Vis.
“I would like to thank the town’s port authority not only for bringing trash cans but also for disposing of the waste properly”. More than 6 billion tons of plastic waste, mostly from the land, has accumulated in the world’s ocean since 1950, and 20 million tons of waste is dumped into the oceans every year.
“Seeing the oceans in this state when we all individually enjoy these great blue spaces makes me sad. The sea belongs to everyone, and everyone should be on a mission to keep it clean.”
This can be done through simple gestures. For example, on his catamaran, Martonio has different bins to sort waste (plastic and organic). They allow recycling waste and obviously not having to throw it into the open sea. Moreover, waste is not only found on the beaches. MARLA encounters a lot of garbage at sea when under way. It has even become a reflex not to leave waste floating in the water. On the contrary! The captain stops as soon as possible to collect debris and to dispose of it ashore later on.
“The sea will eventually give us back everything we put it into by one means or another.”
The Lagoon brand salutes actions like those of Martonio and his crew, and we want to raise awareness among all sailors to collect waste, whether ashore (on beaches, docks, etc.) or at sea. We are sure that all of you have already experienced what the MARLA crew saw. That’s why we are offering you a challenge! You too, like the crew of MARLA, can participate in making the oceans cleaner. Please share your photos on social media, mentioning us with the #LagoonOceanChallenge.
Look after yourselves!