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Fortress C100Home \ Fortresses \ Nov-Dec 2000 \ C100
Location: Bellows Beach |
Sunday, December 10, 2000
Technically, this fortress had six beautiful towers with an arch between two of
them, at the center of the fortress was the tallest tower, reaching a height of
around four feet. But that was before the horrible, tragic collapse. It was
almost finished too. Crap. Fortunately Lisa
took a couple of photos before the disaster.
-Shut up and get to the pictures-
Lisa and I headed out for the beach around 12:45. We would arrive about a half an hour before high tide, which was around 2:00, and even though that wouldn't really give me enough time to construct a drainage fortress in time for it to flood, I brought the drainage pipes anyway. I hadn't built a fortress with a drainage system in over a month and I missed it. I figured I could flood it a few times with a bucket if I had to.
My friend Mark gave me a shovel about a month ago. For any sand sculptor who's even halfway serious about it, a shovel is a must. I didn't have one. I started out digging all the sand by hand and had done fine so far, but recently, I had been thinking about moving up in the world and actually getting a shovel. I told Mark and a couple weeks later, he gave me one. That was a month ago and even though I had been carrying it around in the Jeep, I hadn't used it yet. Today I got it out.
I was glad to have the shovel because I was able to move ten times the sand I could move by hand in the same amount of time. This obviously expedited the process of digging up sand and piling up a base. I had also acquired a second 5-gallon bucket and cut the bottom off. Now I had two molds and used them both. That and the shovel allowed me to get six towers up pretty fast, but not fast enough for the tide: it peaked when I was about halfway through construction of the towers. This meant I had to bring buckets of water to the site to complete its construction and more buckets to flood it manually when it was done.
Once the towers were stacked, I contemplated what style and shape I would give them. I thought about a futuristic design with a rounded top and a channel running the vertical length of the front face of the tower. I made a tower with a style reminiscent of this seven months earlier, in May, on SF5060. The last fortress I made, in November, didn't really satisfy me. I was disappointed with its lack of futuristic details. Lisa and I would be leaving for the mainland the following weekend for the holidays making this the last fortress of 2000 so I wanted to make it a good one.
Once I began carving the towers, I was immediately pleased with the results. The fortress took on a rather menacing, futuristic look. Right on target.
We were getting a little hungry so Lisa took off and got us some crappy fast food hamburgers. For the most part, we avoid fast food, but it seems to go pretty good with a trip to the beach. Road trips, going to the beach, and late night, after drinking a bunch of beers--those are the only occasions fast food is any good. I quickly hogged it and returned to the fortress. The sun was starting to get low in the sky and I had to finish while I still had enough light to take photos.
The tallest tower was in the center. I made an arch connecting it to the tower on its right. I moved around from tower to tower, carving parts of each. I have a short attention span so I have to move around a lot. Lisa took a few pictures as I carved away at the front towers. At one point, a guy walked passed and said simply, "Right on." I turned and thanked him as he continued down the beach, going to wherever he was going, and I continued carving the fortress. I think I like those kind of compliments the best.
About 20 minutes later, the fortress was almost completed. I moved to the front to carve the vertical channel down the tallest tower. It was the only tower still missing its channel. I completed it, then looked over and noticed two cracks in the arch. It was awful. One of the towers must have been moving. By looking at the cracks, I figured the towers were moving apart so without thinking, I dropped my tools, put my hands on the outside of each tower, and gently pressed them together. I watched as the cracks in the arch actually vanished, the sand compressing once again. Then I let go and leaned back to get a wider view of the towers and their arch. It actually looked okay and the arch was repaired. I saved it. I smiled at my knowledge of the sand and my quick reaction. I was pleased with myself for a total of 2 seconds because that's exactly how long it was before the tall tower collapsed, right in front of my eyes, taking the arch down with it.
I was very disappointed. I was so close to being finished. I hate a collapse when I'm almost finished because I'm so close to taking pictures of the final product, and that's the big payoff. It's the worst time for a collapse. It sucks.
Saddened and frustrated, I quickly whacked away at the last few details of the fortress so I could take pictures before the sun was gone and before anything else collapsed. Lisa paused her reading and came down to the building site and asked when the tower collapsed. I told her it had just happened. She was a sweetie. She tried to console me and piled up some sand offering to help fix it, but I told her we needed water and it would take too long--we didn't have enough sun time. I converted what remained of the tower into a wall of sorts and got the camera.
Lisa helped by dumping a bucket of water into the pool behind the fortress while I got into position for some drainage shots. I took several other shots, trying to find angles that de-emphasized the gaping hole that was once the premier tower of the structure.
We packed the stuff into the Jeep and I rinsed the sand off with a quick dip in the water. Winter is the rainy season in Hawaii, but today there had hardly been a cloud in the sky all day. And now it was dead calm, extremely rare for Bellows Beach which is always windy. As I was drying off, standing in front of the Jeep and looking out over the ocean, the sun was casting a pinkish glow across the sky and reflecting off the water. Then I noticed the moon, a full moon, barely visible in the haze, rising just above the horizon. It was all so beautiful.
So I went and took a few more pictures.
We drove home as the sun set, then made our own hamburgers.
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