Feet dance off to Sand Sculpture Contest title at Capitola Beach - Santa Cruz Sentinel
CAPITOLA -- Despite the fog and heavy swell, hundreds attended the Capitola Begonia Festival Sand Sculpture Contest at the Capitola Beach on Saturday.
In fact, all of Capitola was teeming with life: cafes and restaurant were abuzz, families strolled through streets and surfers paddled out for the south swell.
The Sand Sculpture Contest was themed "Let's Dance," prompting competitors to create anything related to dancing.
Walking along the beach was like being in a crowded art gallery with cameras whirring and sculptors standing by proudly. Sculpture judges meandered from among the creations with clipboards in hand and ranked each sculpture as the tide crept up the beach.
"This is a much larger turnout than we've seen before," said volunteer Sue Dallas. "Parents have been really involved with their kids on these projects. Other years, it's sort of been parents just turning their kids lose, but they've really gotten into it today."
The Capitola Begonia Festival, which runs through Monday, is in its 59th year.
The Sand Sculpture Contest began a few years after the Begonia Festival started in 1952. Sue Dallas said she recalled competing in the contest throughout the 1980s and showed pictures from the event that dated back more than 30 years.
"It's always been a really fun, family-oriented event," she said, "and you get to see some really incredible stuff."
She said people came from all over Northern California to
participate.Megan Hubbell, Olivia Bonneville and Amanda Zunimo, all high school seniors, came from Palo Alto to compete for the fifth year in a row, Hubbell said, standing next to their sand creation.
They sculpted a life-sized woman in a dress dancing with a huge star fish.
"This is a fun way to kind of cut loose and make something artistic," Hubbell said. "It's a lot of fun."
They won the grand prize two years ago with their "Swine Flew" sculpture, a winged pig wearing aviation goggles laying in the sand, she said.
Contestant Jennifer Garcia, from Santa Cruz, and her friend Carolyn Janis, from Salinas, sculpted a car-sized octopus holding an iPod in one tentacle, with a seaweed headphone cord leading up to its octopus ears, and playing a piano keyboard with two other tentacles.
"It's a really fun way to spend the day at the beach and it's always cool seeing everyone's reactions to our work," Garcia said. "But I'm not even sure octopuses have ears."
Four young girls from the Westside of Santa Cruz crafted a mermaid using seaweed for the hair, topped with a sombrero and doing the Cha-cha-cha.
They started gathering decorative shells on the beach at 7:45 a.m., said 11-year-old Natalie Neumann.
Bud Bartz and his wife, Jeanette, who were celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary on the beach with their family, shaped a huge pair of "two left feet," complete with detailed toenails and moss for hair.
Zelda's on the Beach restaurant was full of people eating and watching from the deck.
"It's raging," said Raina Davine, a server. "This place is about to get packed after the award ceremony."
At about 1 p.m, people gathered at the judge's tent to hear the results.
The competition was divided into five categories.
Sand Sculpture Contest trophies were awarded to first and second place contestants in each category.
The grand prize went to the Bartz family's "Two Left Feet."
"The kids were just thrilled with the whole thing," said judge Jim Dallas. "It was a good turn out and it looks like people had a really great time."
04 Sep, 2011--
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