CITO Across the World - Mentone BeachÂ
One Day. Many Communities. A World of Difference.
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When: Saturday 19 September, 8:30am – 9:30am
Where:Â Mundy Street carpark, Mentone, working the beach and bushland through to Mentone Lifesaving Club
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A little over 2 years ago georeyna a geocacher in Houston, TX asked a simple question - What could happen if geocachers around Texas came together on one day to make their communities cleaner? Based on that simple question, Texas Geocaching Association (TXGA) created an event named CITO Across Texas in conjunction with World Cleanup Day.
Geocachers throughout Texas held cleanup events on the third Saturday in September. Each event is locally organized, but together they became part of something much bigger. CITO Across Texas was born!
The results have been tremendous. During 2024 and 2025:
- More than 50 CITO events were held across Texas.
- More than 700 volunteers participated.
- Thousands of pounds of trash were removed from parks, trails, waterways, neighborhoods, and other public spaces.
In 2026, we want to take the next step and we are inviting the worldwide community of geocachers to help clean up our game board.
And that's where we come in
Texas is roughly 14,000 kilometres away, which is a fair hike even for the keenest cacher. So instead we're answering the call from our own patch of coastline — Mentone Beach, Port Phillip Bay.
Meet at the Mundy Street carpark at 8:30am. From there we'll work our way along the sand, the dunes, the scrub and the foreshore bushland down to the Mentone Lifesaving Club, and everything in between. It's a beautiful stretch. It'll be a better one by 9:30.
What we're after:Â the usual coastal suspect, cigarette butts (there are always more than you'd think), plastic bottles and bottle caps, takeaway containers, straws, bait bags, fishing line and the endless drift of small micro-plastic fragments that wash up and work their way into the dune grass. Anything that goes into the bay comes back eventually, and anything that doesn't is out there being eaten by something.
What to bring:
Gloves (we'll have spares, but bring your own if you have them)
A hat and sunscreen, spring sun off the water is deceptive
Sturdy shoes for the bush sections
Water
A bag or bucket if you've got one; we'll supply rubbish bags too
What to leave alone:Â syringes ( we will have needle disposal kits) , broken glass in awkward places, dead seabirds (bird flu) , and anything you're not sure about. Â No prize is worth a puncture wound.
Kids and dogs are very welcome. Kids are, in our experience, significantly better at spotting rubbish than adults are — something to do with being closer to the ground and less good at ignoring things.
Log your finds, log your "Will Attend," and take a photo of your haul for the gallery. Every bag counts, and this year every bag is part of something happening in dozens of places at once.
âš“ Stick around afterwards âš“
At 9:30am we pack up and shift straight to the  BBQ for our International Talk Like a Pirate Day event, running 9:30–10:30am. BBQ'd dim sims, snags in bread, and a compulsory pirate accent.
Fitting, really. Pirates spent centuries taking things off the coastline. Least we can do is spend an hour putting it right first.
See you at 8:30. Arrr.
This a map of the area we propose to clean