Good day everyone! So, today I am making another post to try and diversify my Hive account posts somewhat, yesterday I really needed to DO something after being pretty lazy for two days with Christmas, visiting family and playing games, only being inside the house.
It's nice to be with my family don't get me wrong but our body's need to move sometimes too!
I hope you had a great Christmas as well!
I have been to this road side before, it's a b-road close to my village and it leads traffic around a smaller village, in the past all traffic was running straight trough in on it's way to the freeway.
I drive this road to home whenever I come from the north of the country for this is the most logical way home and a lot of people throw their trash out of the car.. 🙄
So, last week when I was driving I saw a lot of cans and bottles in the grass next to the road, every three or four months I come to collect them and the last time I've been here was at the end of the summer just before the grass needed to be cut, I think this was in September, the weather was much better then but the grass was a lot higher so it was more difficult to walk trough, making it a good exercise though! 😁
Having the extra time because I took same days off between Christmas and New Year, I planned to head out to the road side yesterday morning after breakfast, so I got my bicycle and first needed to cycle for about 3 kilometer.
The weather was cold, 2 - 3 degrees Celcius, and it was a little hazy too, the grass was very wet but I came prepared for the cold and the wet grass with warm clothing and rubber boots.
This is the bus stop where I always put my bike to start the walk, from this point I'm walking all the way to the other side of the small village, passing two roundabouts and then circling back at the other side of the road, in total it's well over 5km.
I was the weather was better so the pictures would be prettier but it's December so what to expect else than grey and cold weather, at least it wasn't raining! 😀
So I started walking, I brought my waste grabber, a backpack with some water in it and two waste bags to collect the cans and bottles in, for the deposit money and to clean the environment. Sadly there is a lot more than cans and bottles at the road side but it's too large and too heavy for me to take everything by foot.
I already found some cans while biking to the bus stop, and it only took about 100 meters of walking before I found my first bottle at the road side so I could start filling my bag!
The grass is short now in the winter but the ground is a lot softer because of the rain than the last time I was here, so it was a good exercise again walking here, as you can see there's a lot of space next to the road for me to walk and still be safe for the passing traffic, it was a Friday and apparently a lot of people were still working, there was a lot of traffic passing me, but sometimes when there wasn't any for a moment, I was enjoying the quiet nature and being outside all by myself.
But then suddenly a police car was driving past me, I was startled for a second, not knowing if they would think it's okay for me the walk here close to the traffic, I just minded my own business and when it just passed me, the police officer shouted out of the speaker on the roof of the car 'lekker bezig!' meaning 'good job!' 😁
Well, cool! I didn't expect that to happen lol!
When I leave home and pack my back I used to take just one waste bag, but the last time I went it was filled to the top, so this time I took two with me, just to be safe and I was really glad I did because this is at the half way point, all the way to the other side of the village and the point I'm crossing the road and double back to where I left my bicycle, my first bag is completely full already! This is by far the most I ever found in one day.
I stopped a while to change bags and drink some water, I tied the full waste bag to my backpack and then started my way back again.
And then, just after I took this picture with the church on the background, the police car returned, it has been over an hour so I kinda forgot about it, busy looking for cans and bottles and watching my steps, a tractor has been driving in the grass making the ground very uneven with it's tires, the police officer now talked trough the speaker on the roof before he passed me so I could wave at him. 'nog steeds lekker bezig, bedankt he!' meaning 'still doing a good job, thanks for your work!'.
I found some really strange things in the road side, two nitrous oxide tanks young people uses as a party drug, a shoe, a pack of yogurt, multiple glass pots which once had vegetables in them and something gross too, a killed heron, half decaying... 😩
Eventually I reached my bike again, I could feel my legs now so it's good to head back home again, my second bag was almost full as well.
This was the contents of the first bag, I washes then cans and bottles on the outside so it's easier to deposit them at the recycling machine so I don't get as many errors and making the machine all dirty and muddy.
The gold colored cans are all beer cans, apparently people think it's normal to drink while driving 😬 (and throwing it out of the car too).
76 cans and bottles in the first bag.
For some reason the second bag contained A LOT of Red Bull cans, the first three rows on the left is all Red Bull!
71 cans and bottles in the second bag, making this a total of 147!
each can and bottle is worth 15 cents in my country, so this cleaning trip was not only good for my health and the environment, but I also earned €22.05 with it!
My wife thinks I'm a lunatic for all this effort for 'only' €22 but the money isn't my only goal, it's a win - win - win! 😃
With walking, cleaning and counting and after that bringing the bags to the recycling machine in the supermarket it takes quite a lot of time so she's right on that, but it's better than spending the time on the couch, watching Netflix - not that there's anything wrong with that, in fact, I'm going to do that to let my legs rest a bit now 😆
I'm using the money I make with my cleaning trips to put in to the game I love and buy it's native crypto token SplinterShards, or SPS with.
The price yesterday was just over $0.008 per token, meaning I can buy 2722 SPS with money that just was on the street, that's what I call free money!
I'm earning just over 10% APR on this and my in game earnings are getting a slight boost with it as well.
When you are interested in the game, let me know and I'll answer any questions you have and if you're interested, get you started.
Thanks for reading!