Four Wheel Campers Hosts Donner Lake Volunteer Event with Clean Up The Lake

Published Date: September 7, 2024 By FWC Admin

In 2021, Four Wheel Campers began exploring new ways to engage our community and strengthen our environmental impact. With a vision to expand beyond the popular owners' rallies, I proposed a volunteer events program that would bring outdoor enthusiasts together in a meaningful way. The goal was to create opportunities for participants to connect, learn, and enjoy nature, all while supporting reputable environmental nonprofits. These events would be modeled after the rallies, offering camping, food and beverages to make the experience as rewarding as the work. Four Wheel Campers enthusiastically embraced the idea, and the inaugural volunteer event was held in April 2022 to celebrate Earth Day.

Clean Up The Lake is a California-based nonprofit 501(c)(3) that utilizes scuba divers, snorkelers, kayakers and a tri-toon boat to remove debris underwater. To date, they have removed over 71,000 pounds of litter from Lake Tahoe and surrounding lakes, and they recently opened an environmental dive center.

In August 2024 we partnered with Clean Up The Lake for our third annual summer event, removing over 300 pounds of freshwater debris from Donner Lake in Northern California. Volunteers got to know one another over beers at camp on the first night, and the first full day was spent collecting debris underwater, transferring it to the boat, and finally, hauling it to shore. On the second day, we sorted, weighed and logged the debris at camp, along with a load from another recent cleanup. After a brief presentation by Colin West, founder and executive director of Clean Up The Lake, volunteers received a tour of the org’s research truck, which is outfitted with a Project M topper. Four Wheel Campers donated the camper in late 2022, and it serves as a mobile dive unit, allowing org staffers to spend more time off the grid on pilot missions and cleanups.

Once debris has been collected, volunteers sort, weigh and log it. This helps Clean Up The Lake gather the necessary data to develop long-term solutions with local communities and natural resource management agencies.

Larry Baab, CEO of Four Wheel Campers, also attended the event, mingling with volunteers while sorting debris, and later by the campfire. “Outdoor events are central to Four Wheel Campers’ company culture, so offering our community the chance to give back to nature makes perfect sense,” says Baab. Four Wheel Campers volunteer events are free and open to the public, and we are looking to add new locations in the years to come. You can check our Stewardship & Community page for more info on past and future events, or sign up for our newsletter to stay in the loop. Thank you to all of our volunteers for your hard work, and we are beyond thrilled to kick off our fourth year of this program in 2025!