MARICOPA COUNTY, Ariz. — Walking down to Sheep Crossing on the Salt River, Connie Wickstrom and her crew are carrying a lot.
Between the kayaks, paddleboards, coolers, and scuba gear, it's easy to tell they're in for quite the trip.
Wickstrom and Sea 2 Sea divemaster Joe Sheehan, gear up with their oxygen tanks and diving fins and begin walking upstream.
"When we started, this was a workout routine out here," Wickstrom said.
They started diving here in October, Wickstrom said.
"As I was going down to the bottom, I noticed that there was a lot of stuff down there that people have dropped," Wickstrom said.
Since the tubing season started in May, Wickstrom and her friends have spent a lot of time underwater.
"Every time you go down, you end up with something coming out," Sheehan said.
Between what they've found on the Salt River's riverbed via scuba diving and what they've spotted and been able to pick out by simply reaching in shallow spots with their hands, Wickstrom estimates they've been able to reunite about 30 phones to their rightful owner.
Wickstrom then takes the items, charges the electronics up and posts them to her social media in hopes of finding to whom they belong.
Lost and found
Others, like one phone Wickstrom and her crew found on Monday, she's able to power on, and call the information the medical ID the phone had and get it back to the owner.
"The thought that somebody's losing memories is what was really important to me," Wickstrom said. "Because my thing is, if my house burns down, I just want my pictures. And so I think it's the same thing with phones I don't know that anybody cares too much about the actual phone. But if you have pictures in there that are lost forever."
The crew travels down the river on kayaks and paddle boards, keeping vigilant eyes on the water to see if anything catches their eye they can pull out.
During the deepest, most challenging spots, and places where tubers and others are known to lose items, Wickstrom will dive, cruising along the bottom searching for anything of note.
On Monday's search, between Wickstrom and her crew, they pulled out several vapes, five total phones, a car key, and a few pairs of sunglasses.
Wickstrom carries down with her on the tough workout 60 pounds of gear and 26 years of experience.
"I tell you what, by the end of the season I should be pretty trim," Wickstrom said.
In addition to reuniting items she finds, Wickstrom has people message her to search for items they've lost.
One story Wickstrom shared included helping to recover a woman's sentimental medal, which was given to the woman before her husband died. Wickstrom was able to dive into the location where it was lost and return the medal to its owner.
Cleaning up the environment
While she's not always finding someone's memories, she does notice the trash and glass bottles littering the bottom.
"I did see some beer bottles, which, despite the number of warnings about not bringing bottles down there, there are a ton of bottles. So I would really like to see a change in that," Wickstrom said.
"Anything with a lithium battery we try to definitely scoop out," Sheehan said.
Wickstrom said she's planning a river clean-up for the end of the season to try and get more of the trash picked up.
Still hoping the time on and under the water will help catch the eye of the long-lost owners.
"I mean, paying forward, giving back, working out: Win, win, win," Wickstrom said.
Wickstrom said if you lose or have lost something on the Salt River, private message her on her social media sites, as people can troll the comments and try and find the items first and sell them instead.
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