The Castle

I love the beach.  But only up to a point.  I find it difficult to spend more than half a day at any beach, even the most beautiful Caribbean sort.  Honestly, beaches are hot, and activities are a bit limited.  Swimming, sunbathing, perhaps reading, frisbeeing and paddleballing, and sand-castle-building.  We don't have a frisbee, nor paddles and a ball.  We do have plenty of sand, though.  So we make castles.  Pauline and I have constructed castles on every beach we've encountered along the Caribbean.  Just walls and moats and towers.  By hand, with absolutely no artistic merit.  Any ol' five-year-old could do the same.

And as the tide starts to rise, we watch the waves slowly lick the castle to death.  Good fun in between dips in the ocean.  But interestingly and sadly enough, our primitive castles are always conspicuously alone.  We've never seen another person attempt the challenging feat of piling sand and digging trenches.  Not even the ol' five-year-olds do it...and there are plenty of them around !


Our latest visit to the beach was in a small town called Camarones, meaning "Shrimp".  The beach there was no Caribbean beauty, but had clean white-ish sand and small gray or hazel-ish waves that we thoroughly enjoyed.  And when the tide started to rise, we did like on all the other beaches...we made a castle.  Not any prettier or artisitic than our other creations, but this one was considerably larger.  And heads turned.  The other beach-goers, all locals, came to gaze upon our piled sand.   And to take photos.  It made me smile, and at the same time, feel a bit uncomfortable.  In a sane world, childishly-made sand castles should not be seen as exceptional or photo-worthy.  Except by the proud builders, of course.


But there was a group of four boys who stayed distant.  They watched us and the castle off and on for over an hour, but never came within 30 meters.  The boys were keeping their distance, but a storm was fast approaching.  By the time the rains began, most of the castle had been washed away to sea.  But a few parts resisted.  Beaming with architectural pride, we abandoned the surviving towers and walls to the elements and ran for cover.  As I ran, I glanced over my shoulder and saw those same four boys, their wait now over, dash to the castle and jump on and crush the remaining walls and towers.  Then they jumped for joy for their victory and ran to find shelter of their own.