Digging for victory on sands of time (From Western Telegraph)

Digging for victory on sands of time

A PEMBROKESHIRE beach was transformed on Friday by a city of sand churches.

For the 14th year running, Whitesands, near St Davids, was the venue where children got creative, families came together and competitive fathers took over, to design and sculpt sand churches in a competition organised by the St Davids Peninsula Tourist Association.

Glastonbury Tor, Norwich Cathedral, St Govan's, a few versions of St Davids Cathedral and indeed St Davids Head and peninsula were all masterfully recreated in sand.

My job was not only to report, but also to judge the competition with Amanda Camby-Lewis, from Cadw, and Canon Jonathan Lean, representing St David's Cathedral.

There were 60 entries and after considerable deliberations we chose the winning sand churches for each category.

The winner of the disabled category was Mrs Edwards of Weston-Super-Mare. Joshua Malyen, from Uxbridge, won the children's category, and Play Box Theatre, from Solihull, took the organisations category.

Winner of the family category, for the second year running, were three families - the Smiths from Gloucester, the Handleys from Yorkshire and the Mitchells from Hereford.

In second place were the Flower and Shaddick families from Bath Winners received cash prizes donated by the sponsors - the Western Telegraph and St Davids Peninsula Tourist Association.

Organiser Rod Williams said: "This competition is incredibly successful and has just got bigger and bigger. One year we had 84 entrants so we have now restricted it to 60. This has been an exceptional year with very impressive entries."

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