That was a nice weekend, there's a part of me that worries when it's so unseasonably warm, but then even I'm going to acknowledge that we've not had a good summer. For the first time in ages I managed to get out on the mountain bike and really enjoyed getting my tyres dirty!

One thing that has really shocked me over the weekend and particularly this morning is the litter. Whilst out riding at the weekend the main thing I noticed were the "poo bags"; I'm sure that the majority of dog owners are responsible, bag their pets waste and either take it home or put it in the appropriate bin.

However there are some who either hang the bag in a tree or just leave it on the path; surely these people would be better off not clearing up after the pet, at least the organic waste would degrade and wash away fairly quickly unlike a plastic bag containing the same waste!?

Having said this I do have to state that the Bournemouth and Poole area is a dog waste free haven compared to the Gloucestershire town where my sister lives. I visited her last weekend and was shocked whilst walking into town at how carefully you needed to tread in order to avoid stepping in a pile of poo!

This morning I was expecting to see more litter along the seafront than usual as we had a very warm and sunny weekend that saw people flocking to the beach for what might be the last chance this year. I wasn't prepared for what greeted me this morning as I rode along the length of the seafront.

Along the Poole stretch the bins were overflowing and rubbish bags and litter were piled up by the bins, but the beach was pretty much clear of rubbish.

Bournemouth on the other hand was very different; some bins were obviously full but there weren't any neat piles of rubbish by the bins, instead this was strewn across the beach and in some cases it was obvious that a group of people had been enjoying themselves on the beach and had left their rubbish in a pile where they had been sitting.

Does this suggest that Poole has a better class of beachgoer that Bournemouth, or had the crew been out clearing the beach by the time I got there? One thing I can say for certain is the site of Bournemouth beach this morning was quite upsetting and makes me fear for future generations as this is getting worse and worse every year.

My last litter related rant for this week is about Moors Valley, I visited in September with my daughter and we had a great day on the bikes and on the brilliant play trail. However, there was one thing that really surprised me; there are no litter bins at Moors Valley.

I had noticed a few pieces of litter whilst we were making our way around the play trail and always wonder at the mentality of people that drop litter. At this point I hadn't realised that there were no bins for people to dispose of litter.

Back at the visitor centre later on we bought ourselves an ice cream and it was at this time that I realised I had nowhere to put the wrapper that they had kindly given me when I bought my ice cream.

After a few minutes of wandering around with this rubbish in my hand I saw that one of the kiosks has a tub on the counter for you to put your wrappers in, but only because the staff at that kiosk had taken it upon themselves to provide it.

It's a wonderful ideal, for Moors Valley to ask visitors to take their rubbish home with them, but it's not very realistic and whilst I can't condone littering I do have a bit more sympathy for visitors to this park, especially when the rubbish you want to dispose of is directly as a result of having purchased something from the park itself!

Based on information supplied by David Brown.