Meridian Sandcastle Competition

The picturesque sands of Ryde’s Appley Beach took centre stage on Thursday 27th July when they played host to ITV’s annual Meridian Sandcastle Competition.

The Island shows the rest of the South Coast how it’s done

Now in its 10th year, the Meridian Sandcastle Competition which is scheduled to take place at various seaside locations across the South throughout the summer months, travelled to Ryde to make its first appearance of 2006. One of the South’s longest-serving broadcasters; popular news presenter Fred Dinenage was accompanied on Appley Beach by camera crews to capture the proceedings which are scheduled to be broadcast as part of special feature on Meridian Tonight on Friday 4th August.

Despite the threat of stormy conditions stemming from the recent heat-wave that has been sweeping the Island, the weather remained true to the standard set by the event in all other years. The sun shone down upon the 270 competition entrants who had made their way to Ryde in a bid to test their creative sandcastle-building skills against one another.

Enthusiasm captured the spirits of children and parents alike

ITV staff who were present to co-ordinate the registration process told iwight.com that the turn-out on the Island had been very good this year compared to neighbouring seaside towns within the meridian area. However, the record number of entrants was broken a couple of years ago on the Isle of Wight when over 400 youngsters registered to take part in the Sandcastle Competition – again, on Appley Beach.

With the upper age limit for the competition set at 12, all young people were required to be accompanied by an adult in order to take part, and as you will see from our online gallery the adults were equally as competitive as their children; if not more so!

Safety comes first

Volunteers from Barton Primary School & Early Leaning Centre in Newport successfully promoted the all-important ‘Seaside Safety’ message as endorsed by the Isle of Wight Council whilst ensuring that the youngsters in their care had as much fun as anyone else present.

The class of children who came along to Appley Beach to represent the school were all dressed in florescent colour-coordinated shorts, t-shirts and hats which meant that they were easily recognisable to teachers if they did happen to stray away from their group.

Dig the creativity!

Sandcastle designs ranged from innovative recreations of movie stars such as Johnny Depp, UK glamour model Jordan and even a sand-crafted 3D image of television presenter Fred Dinenage himself! There were also sculptures of sharks, crocodiles and butterflies along with the more traditional castles and fortresses. Many of these were complemented by flags, candles, shell-lined drawbridges and even action men figurines that were carefully positioned to play the role of soldiers!

For the second year in a row Isle of Wight Radio DJ Alex Dyke teamed up with Fred Dinenage to become a celebrity judge and together they spent over an hour surveying the various entries before drawing the crowd together to announce the results of the 10th Meridian Sandcastle Competition to grace Ryde seafront.

A ‘shore-fire’ decision

In third place was a contemporary sand sculpture of Captain Jack Sparrow from the newly released film Pirates of the Caribbean 2 which was created by Charlie Scriver aged 8 from Ventnor.
The second place prize was presented to brothers Luke and Craig West (aged 8 and 12) from Sandown for their design entitled ‘Meridian Rocks’ which soon became a natural firm favourite with the TV personality!
First Place was awarded to Chelsea Alexander and Layla Harrop aged 11 and both from Newport for their composition in sand affectionately named ‘Love Dolphins.’

Aside from the opportunity to appear on Meridian TV at the beginning of August, the winners were presented with bags containing various pieces of ITV merchandise for their efforts including brand new buckets and spades. It is hoped that these will encourage these talented young people to take part in the competition once again when it pays a return visit to the Isle of Wight next July.

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