Today is day two of the Tortuga Music Festival, Fort Lauderdale's version of SunFest on the Beach. It features the biggest names in country, rock, roots, and rap music.
Yes, it's all about the music, the beer, and the skin... But if you look a little deeper, right in the heart of The Tortuga Music Festival is an Ocean Conservation Village hosted by a charity called Rock The Ocean.
Festival goers were genuinely taking time from the beach party to seek information in the village.
I ran into vendor after vendor who had tips on simple changes we can make to help make the oceans less polluted.
Loggerhead Marine Life Center, out of Juno Beach, has a booth at Tortuga with an astonishing display of Ocean debris found in a turtle patient named Rainman.
"All of this was in his body. And he ended up making it. We rehabilitate turtles like this quite often sadly," said Prestyn McCord, School Programs Coordinator for Loggerhead Marinelife Center.
So far at Tortuga, Rock the Ocean has raised over $1,000,000 for Ocean Conservation Efforts.
So what are Simple ways we can make our Oceans Cleaner?
"Cut out all sources of single-use plastics, and go for anything that's reusable like metal bottles, anything you can use over and over again," advises Prestyn.
Aarin Allen from the Sea 2 Shore Alliance out of Boynton Beach had similar feelings on plastics, "Instead of plastic shopping bags, either use paper, or reusable shopping bags and avoid the plastic straws--use reusable straws if possible.
