Kiel next...but first a tube in the waves.

I grew up hearing about the Kieler Woche. The sail racing bonanza that most of my sail racing buddies attended, but not me. I guess I was not a good competitor enough, or I focused on other sailing adventures instead? Anyway, on the way down I grabbed a plastic tube from the waves in some 7-8 knots...

We can only hope it was not thrown into the water on purpose...

Sailing in and around Kiel has been hanging there in front of me as a personal milestone since the days back in the 1980-ies. Those were the days when I was sail racing Flipper with my friend Anders.

Flipper – a dinghy for two. Anders and I never made it to Kieler Woche. But today. Here. Finally. Kiel. Check! Much has happened since the 80-ies: Kieler Woche à la 2018

Sailing south from Denmark I spotted some plastic stuff floating in the waves up front and just by mere luck I threw my hand down and grabbed it. Wohooo – got you! It was an almost emptied plastic tube of toothpaste. This little treasure should show me two things: 1) Somebody dropped plastic in there that could float around for decades and degrade into microplastics, and 2) the content contains microplastics on purpose! Really? In 2018?

See the flakes?

In products' ingredient lists the producer has to list all ingredients, starting with the main content and ending with whatever the least is in there. Aqua is number one. So we buy mostly water in a tube. Number five is PEG-12 – some kind of plastic. How does that affect us, where does it end up?

40 tons of microplastic particles from body treatment products end up in the Baltic Sea every year according to a study in 2015 by the University of Stockholm. Every year! The image shows hygiene/beauty peeling products in a certain amount, and in front is the amount of microplastics from the respective product. So sad to see...

But there is hope. Some conscious producers say no to microplastics and use natural ingredients in their peeling and deep cleaning products...

....like grained seeds from black currant berries or bee's wax – ingredients that have been used for decades. Go YR Skincare Go! Using microplastic grains in body treatment products has to come to an end. Now.