Sand Castle Contest

Eric's birthday!  And a trip to Cannon Beach, Oregon for the annual Sand Castle Building Contest.

Eric and Sylvia drove down to Cannon Beach, Oregon, to see the annual Sand Castle building contest.  Rain was coming down in sheets on the way down.  Luckily we had a brief moment of clearing right as we got there.  From where we parked, you were able to drive your car down to the area where the contest was heldAll kinds of cars...


Some lucky dogs were carried...A brief moment of clearing lets us get a great shot of Haystack Hill (or something like that).  It's an unusual type of rock formation fairly common on the Oregon/Washington coast..


After a little walk we got to the contest area.  There was a pretty wide range of skill levels, from church youth groups...


...to little kids who got inspired from all the digging and carving and decided to make their own sculptures.


The really skilled groups had their plots further north on the beach. Some were really well done.  One group had a really cute bear looking into a car.  Here's some pictures from their plot.






Another group had a "big top" circus theme.


One had a living room theme that was quite realistic.  Note the beer can on the table.  The couch didn't look all that comfortable, though.


The dot com scene also made an appearance


Castles, not surprisingly, were also pretty popular, ranging from the simple to the much more elaborate.


And we had all kinds of animals, fish, dogs, dinosaurs, dragons, you name it.




Tools ranged from shovels to drywall trowels to feather dusters




This one was cute--Fish 'n Ships.


A couple times Eric had to lift me up so that I could get a good view.Last year they did this one face up, this time the poor guy was face down in the sand.