The sands of Ponte Vedra Beach have a greater holding capacity than most other sands along the Florida coast from Fernandina to Daytona Beach. Or at least that’s how it seemed to this newly formed Ponte Vedran growing up on the Boulevard in the 1970s. I had built my fair share of castles along this stretch of the Atlantic and I can tell you right now, material matters.
Perhaps it is the embedded minerals that made Mineral City famous in the first place, or the idea that the sand contains the perfect ratio of micro-organics. It could simply be the just-right plasticity of the powdered complexes that makes it perfect for building. But every year, as soon as the water just beneath the sand’s surface warms enough to overcome winter’s numbness, usually in May, castles begin to appear at mid to low tide.
Along the lower stretches of PV, just north of the site of the old Innlet, where the Lodge is today, lies the premier sand for castle building. For the best constructions and opportunities for leisure, site selection and tide timing are absolute essentials. Nothing is worse than surveying an area that appears to be perfect on a broad greyfield beach just off from your house only to discover a thick vein of coquina shell an inch or so beneath the surface. If you’ve ever built a sandcastle on Ponte Vedra Beach, you know exactly what I’m talking about.
Sandcastles come in a number of shapes, sizes and forms, and levels of completeness ranging from the simple bucket-and-pail variety to the compacted-and-carved. Yet, of all the styles able to be made, the PV sands are most naturally suited for the elegant, skillful, Gaudí-esque, hand-dripped varieties that are wildly popular for combining functional structure with sculptural beauty. Pure play.
Castle building is an exercise in patience, observation, organic necessity and innovation. Put five beach guests together working on a single castle and you have community enrichment. There is a lot that can be learned from sandcastle building, and the younger those discoveries are made, the more impactful they are on later learning.
It may seem trivial to elevate a sandcastle to the level of a life tutorial, but what this biomimicry in sand represents is the very definition of leisure in its purest form. Until the activity is performed in earnest, the lessons remain locked beneath the surface, and the beach is reduced to a flat stretch of sand ruled by walkers and others gathering for calisthenics. There is something important in the impermanence of a sandcastle that only happens while testing nature’s most efficient solutions for structural stability and beauty. Build an arch of sand and you’ll discover this truth for yourself. When using sand as a whiteboard, anything can be taught, and young minds will be eager to join in.
Branching columns, bone-like support, double twist columns: have we lost our ability to play in the sand? There are physics around us at the granular level and sandcastles amplify these dynamics to the level of allegory. They reward their builders from ages 8 months to 80 years and beyond with benefits that touch the heart and enrich the mind one handful of sand at a time.
Let the mixture flow through your fingers and draw up a spire to the height of three to four inches and you will understand. It takes practice.
The best time to build a drip castle varies for everyone, but the ideal window is a lowering high tide in the late mid-morning or, better yet, working the start time backwards from a late-evening high tide. Start the castle at your selected site just after the tide recedes from that point. It takes patience, time and attention; and it begins with a center pool and wall around on all sides, then a moat, then the spires, arches and other details. An occasional shark’s tooth will most likely emerge in the center pool much to the builder’s delight. It’s here, in this pool, that the sand will mix with the ground water and be warmed in the sun. A lot goes into sandcastle building if it’s going to be done right.
In 1974, Kaki Smith, Kandi Gogolak and others saw the potential for doing it right. They coordinated builds so that, just as the sun dipped below the horizon, candles in small alcoves built into the structures could be lit. The entire castle would glow and provide cocktail illumination for visiting families, Jamie and Kippy, their friends, and the other kids involved in the build. Parents would mingle and network with neighbors along the Boulevard and guests visiting from Jacksonville or who were down for the season. By dark, the kids were exhausted.
But young hands had learned from older hands how to make the delicate spires and some kids innovated by carrying handfuls of wet sand up to the dry powdered sand at the upper beach and “casting” small blocks in sun-heated sand there, bringing them back down to be stacked as parapets, and candle chambers on the castle.
Some builders made holes creating windows and learned about structural capacity that kept the castle sound without letting it dry out and collapse. Some created viewing holes that looked past other spires and out to sea as a naval officer in training might do.
It was always a surprise when the small clam-like shells in the shallow pools within the walls came alive and would orient themselves vertically and burrow back into the sand. When a small, nearly transparent crab would dart across the castle and into a nearby hole, the younger kids would jump and then laugh. Everyone would lock these moments into their memory for a lifetime.
Passersby would always stop, survey, comment, and maybe even join in for a moment or two. Experience told us that it was always unwise to leave the castle unattended even for a moment. There’s something in the character of some people that simply cannot resist the urge to stomp the sand as giants often do. Most likely, these types were never exposed to the treasury of secrets held in the sands and they never discovered the lessons building a sandcastle can teach. Nothing is worse than returning from a quick trip to the house only to find the midday work has been destroyed by an ogre’s raid.
Yet castle building will always prevail. It is beach leisure worth pursuing. The surf will reset the canvas with every tide. Enjoy the beach. Time will be suspended in the sand and in the architecture that rises from it. The activity will prompt stories, stir the imagination, and is a gentle reminder of what is revealed through play, determination, and perseverance. It enhances our sense of wonder and celebrates our creativity. While not exclusive to PV, sandcastles help define the character of this smartly casual place of all places, Ponte Vedra Beach.
