Beach Waste Turns Into Art

A week ago Rio del Mar beach looked sad, covered by piles and piles of driftwood, dead birds, giant swaths of seaweed and general ocean murk stirred up from the big storms.

It almost looked like too much to clean up.

But Sunday, there they were, in the Santa Cruz beach tradition—stick walls, stick people, stick symbols and even stick structures. One of them housed six teens who said they spent days building it and now were comfortably hanging out in the driftwood home.

Looking at a for-rent sign on the vacation rentals a ways behind it, I thought, well, maybe, just maybe, someone will be moving in cheap.

Santa Cruz's main beach was pristine after the storms. Rio took the biggest hit, but like Capitola last year, locals couldn't resist improvising.