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travel / adventure zone
| The Adventure Zone |
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BEACH
BLANKET BINGO,
it isn't. But as an inspired farewell
to the last of the lazy, crazy days of summer, the Harrison Hot
Springs World Championships of Sand Sculpture Competition will
leave you longing for more fun in the sun. Scheduled from September
2 to 7, the event, which is a world-class competition fusing creativity
with physical stamina and teamwork, attracts an international cast
of artists who create a range of artistic visions in eye-popping
three dimensions. Solo and team artists toil for up to 100 person-hours
to prove that sand sculpture is an art form to be reckoned with.
Tucked into the beautiful
Fraser Valley and located just an hour and a half east of Vancouver,
Harrison Lake boasts "angular" and "silty" sand,
which is far more sculptable than the ball-bearing, tide-rolled
grains found oceanside. An added bonus: in the absence of tides,
sculpting teams have much longer to create — and to savour — their
work.
Sand sculpture on this scale (one record-setting castle was almost
5.5 metres tall) is as much a feat of engineering as it is imagination.
Using forms to create foundations and small knives and spatulas
as carving tools, participants mix tonnes of sand with thousands
of litres of water, carefully and systematically stirring and tamping
their recipes, before unleashing their artistry to create multiple-spired
castles, dragons or works of abstract art.
Part of sand sculpture's charm, of course, is its ephemeral
nature. As one longtime sculptor wisely notes: "The sculpture
doesn't belong to me; I can't take it home, can't guard
it on the beach. Its water will evaporate, its grains dissociate." But
at Harrison Lake, for a modest fee, visitors have till Thanksgiving
to take in the wondrous works from the beach — until, that
is, the winds of autumn take their inevitable toll.
For more information on the Harrison Hot Springs World Championships
of Sand Sculpture Competition, visit
www.harrisand.org
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