Beach time with family is a given over holiday breaks. Try spending your next beach day with a single goal in mind…

Building an epic sandcastle!

Here are a few tricks of the trade to improve your building success:

1. Bring tools including buckets and flat household carving items like spatulas, spoons or rulers.

2. Build a strong base by mounding dry sand into a volcano shape with a two- or three-inch deep rim. Fill the volcano with water and use hands and feet to compact the base into a strong foothold as gravity pulls the water down.

3. Mold with sticky sand by allowing excess water to drain off waterlogged sand before free-form building or compacting sand into buckets for towers.

4. Join structures with castle cement in one-inch layers. Combine equal parts water and sand until a thick soupy consistency is achieved. Apply cement to desired areas, shaping and compacting as you work to strengthen base shapes or mold bridges.

5. Carve from top to bottom using tools to cut in details once structures are built and shaping is complete.

6. Fill in holes you dug before leaving the beach so that nesting sea turtles and their babies don’t get trapped. You can read more about sea turtle nesting in Volusia County here.

7. Don’t get too attached because your sand castle reign usually ends when the sun sets. If the tide doesn’t claim your castle, tiny tower-stomping humans like the one pictured above will!

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