VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. — A wizard, an astronaut and a mermaid were all at the Virginia Beach Oceanfront this weekend, and they’re all made entirely out of sand.
The Neptune Festival’s International Sand-Sculpting Championship is back at the beach.
More than 30 master sand sculptor’s from all over the world built massive works of art using just sand and water, all competing for thousands of dollars in prize money.
RELATED: Virginia Beach Neptune Festival's sand sculpting competition brings artists from across the globe
“We give a total purse of $58,000 to the sculptors,” Neptune Fest CEO Kit Chope said. “And so you’ll see around here we’ve got sculptors from Lithuania, Latvia, the Republic of Korea, Canada, the Netherlands, Italy.”
Chope said the sculptors are given 30 hours to complete a masterpiece. After they’re done, judges decide their favorites and visitors get an up close look at the finished product.
“So we obviously have a been affected by the weather -- we lost half of the days,” Chope said. “Usually we’re open for 10 days. This year, we’ve only been open for five. The public is coming out and what that tells us is the folks want to see these masterpieces. Folks want to come be a part of this event and so we had probably close to 8,000 to 9,000 people come through in just the last few days.”
Virginia Beach local Don Kroeller said although this is one of his favorite events at the Neptune Festival it’s hard to pick a favorite sculpture.
“I come out here every year. It’s fantastic,” he said. “Just the attention to detail -- I just can’t even imagine putting one of these together… There’s no way I could be a judge because I just am absolutely floored every time I see them, I really am.”
Sunday is the last day to see the sculptures. The event site is open until 8 pm tonight inside a tent at 7th street at the Virginia Beach oceanfront.