THAYER, WV (WOAY) – ACE Adventure Resort just held the inaugural New River Gorge Festival–a weekend festival full of live music and various kinds of recreational activities to honor the beloved New River and everything it has to offer us.
This successful first-ever festival ended the right way with a clean-up of the river.
“We love recreating out here on the New River,” says Chris Colin, special events coordinator for ACE. “At ACE Adventure Resort we’re out here on the river every day whitewater rafting, mountain biking along the side of the river, climbing the rocks next to the river, so we want this area to look beautiful, for our enjoyment as well as our guests that come out here.”
The river clean-up crew was joined by New River Conservancy for an extra set of hands as they cleaned up trash, tires, and other items that might not belong in the waters of our precious river.
“We’ve had a good relationship with ACE for many years and they’ve organized this festival for this weekend, and as part of it, they’ve included this clean-up opportunity and donated transportation, lunches, rafts, and guides to help participate in the effort,” Dave Bassage, New River Gorge program coordinator for New River Conservancy, says.
The crews planned on paddling about a 5-mile stretch of the river, putting in at Thayer and making their way down to ACE Beach just below Thurmond. And everyone seemed eager to get out on the water for a day of cleaning up our famous river, honoring it, and getting it ready to be shown off to the many oncoming visitors getting a taste of this new national park and preserve.
“West Virginia is a beautiful state, that’s why we all live here, right? They say it’s almost heaven, wild and wonderful, you know all these things are true. And the words getting out, people are finding out about it and they will definitely be coming here wanting to see all these awesome places,” Colin says.
While these frequent river clean-ups are always pretty successful, one clean-up expedition resulted in pulling a total of 72 tires out of the river in one day.
ACE plans to hold another New River Gorge Festival next year, and they plan for another river clean-up to go along with it.
