Page 9 - aruba-today-20230804

A9
LOCAL Friday 4 august 2023

Another Treasure of Aruba’s Beaches: Sea Glass!

NOORD - It is hard to imag-
ine this happening today,
but years ago people
dumped all kinds of refuse
straight into the ocean, in-
cluding old cars, and their
household garbage, which
of course included lots of
glass. Over the next 30
years the pounding waves
cleaned the beach, by
breaking down everything
but glass and pottery. The
pounding waves washed
the trash up and down,
back and forth. Tons of pol-
ished, broken glass pieces
were created by the pound-
ing surf. These smoothened,
colored glass particles then the beach. The waves and
settled along the sea shore weather conditions wore If you like to see the sea
in millions, and that is why down the overwhelming glass for yourself, and be
you can find these beauti- amount of garbage in the in awe of the power of na-
ful and colorful pieces on water, creating millions of ture, rent a car or jeep and
the north shore beaches of beautiful smooth rocks. go explore our deserted
Aruba. beaches on the north side
It’s hard to believe the of the island. Make it a fun
Especially on the strip on short-sighted mistakes we family day!
white sand between the fa- were making that could Even if we didn’t mean to
mous Natural Bridge” and have potentially ruined pollute the Beaches how
the huge red anchor close 10 to 30 years to make sea are being used for decora- these beautiful beaches. we did, it is inspiring to see
to “Grapefield” beach you glass. The name for any tion, handcrafts and jew- But thanks to natural pro- just how the earth can cor-
will be able to find your own piece of glass that finds its elry! cesses, the ocean trans- rect our mistakes.
pieces of sea glass. The sea way to the ocean and tum- Once glass makes its way formed the trash into the
glass that was created is bles around in the water into the ocean, the glass is sea glass. Funny, how trash can
the product of a very long long enough is “Sea glass. broken up into shards and is Each colored gem on the change into treasures!
and interesting process. It tumbled around in the wa- beach has its own story.
can take anywhere from The colorful pieces of glass ter, where sand and other Everybody knows that you
rocks act like sandpaper to The ruby red glass stones are not allowed to take
smooth out its rough edges. are typically from old car local shells home, but the
Sometimes as the sea glass tail-lights. people working at the air-
is passed through fire, it be- port have no problem you
comes fire glass, the rarest Then, the sapphire rocks taking sea glass home. A
of sea glass with certain are the remnants of bro- few of those pieces make
inclusions, just like precious ken apothecary bottles. great souvenirs. You can
gems. The most common and place them in a wine glass
the easiest to find are the or large bottle for decora-
For years, the water beat brown (Amstel & Polar tion and every time you
against the different kinds beer), green (Heineken look at it a smile will light up
of trash being dumped. & Balashi beer) and clear your face thinking back of
Glass, household appli- glass which are the soft your unforgettable Aruba
ances and even motor much loved “soft drink” vacation! q
parts were discarded on bottles.