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LOCAL Wednesday 8 March 2023

Another Treasure of Aruba’s Beaches: Sea Glass!

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