VOLUNTEER, our country needs us!

For most of us, our local political circle is usually the most important. The local city councilman, the school board president, and the city manager make more decisions affecting your personal life than anyone else. Those local politicians can make your life good... or really bad!

Recently, this company, WET River Trips, invited members of our local Chamber to participate in a beautiful rafting trip called Middle Fork American River. This is the river that would have drowned under the Auburn Dam. Sharing this river and the beautiful corridor with Sacramento's finest business owners was a pleasure! They loved the trip and appreciated the whitewater and the glorious canyon.

What we hope is that they will spread the word about this incredible resource in our backyard. Maybe our local chamber and our community will appreciate that travelers from all over the world are impressed with this river and it's magnificent canyon corridor. Maybe our leaders will help us save this recreational resource as a possible revenue creator for local businesses such as restaurants, lodging and promotions.

One thing I want to stress, too, is the lack of transportation from Sacramento International Airport or San Francisco International Airport to places like Lake Tahoe, ski resorts and/or California whitewater rafting sites. International travelers complain about this every single year as they fly into California and wonder why traveling requires them to rent a car.

We have got to fix this! If not for the international traveler, but for the rest of us Californians! We need a way to travel to our favorite destinations without getting into personal cars. Why can't I hop on a bullet train to Tahoe? Why can't I get up to Squaw to ski without my car? And, the hundreds of thousands that come up to South Fork American every year... why isn't there a bullet train to Placerville, the gateway to South Shore?

The organizations in your local community are important, too. The neighborhood associations, the chamber of commerce and the art/social committees are so important for the quality of our lives. These are the groups that can make sure that we have clean parks, events in our city and an appreciation for the arts community which includes performance art and music.

This fall and winter volunteer in your community! Our entire state needs each and every one of us to pitch-in and help out our own personal places. Volunteer to help clean up your parks! Help the local community with anything and everything you can do. We are the best resource in helping our local governments with the best resource we can give: ourselves!

Going to volunteer now... Rose garden, rebuild our playground, read to kids at elementary school, and art community!

This post belongs to California Whitewater Rafting W.E.T. River Trips blog.
Thanks to Big Poppah Jah and Google images for their pics of volunteer photos. 
More WET River Trips photos are on flickr.com and Picassa.