You all know that I live behind the only sea-dike in Holland.

But for formal reasons (sealevel worldwide is raising) this dike is no longer fitting the minimum rule of safety. So the choice was to make it higher or supplement sand in front of it.
They have chosen the last.

It took a year to spout all the necessary sand up with a pipeline, dredgers, shovels etc.

It is finished now. So long live the the Dutch with the slogan:
"if it goes water, bring in the Dutch".

For me as the (only) catsailor starting from this new beach, it is momentary just a nightmare. The damned breakwaters in front of the dike are gone, but the devil gave me a nasty sea in return!

Enjoy the bumpy ride:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uq1qGtOa-WU


P.S. For those who are interested in the spouting of this new beach and dunes, here's a very nice vid taken with a drone:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usVAbX22jNc

Did you know there is a big lawsuit over the sand suppletion?
Apparently they used the wrong kind of sand at some parts of the coast, the size of the grain was too small which causes is to blow away too quickly
</FirstWorldProblems>

Tony, I didn't know that about a lawsuit. What I do know is that people in the village had a lot of trouble with this small grain sand.
At a certain moment the contractors have payed for cleaning the cars and the windows of the houses.

This small grain sand is also otherwise a pain in the butt because from 7 bft and higher it goes into your eyes and stays there and troubles you for days after.

I've understood that this small grain sand is used on purpose because it will finally create a more solid sandbeach!!????

But I really do not understand this.

Wow. I thought that kind of nonsense only happens here!

Mike

To make the story even more juicy, Mike, I have to mention the latest rumour which goes around in my village.

They say that picking the win-area for the suppletion sand at sea was infact a mistake. It was not their intention at all, to end up with this small grain sand.

At the former (small)sand suppletion about 2 years ago they explored by accident a win-area which was full of war granates and other munition.
Hence we ended up with a spouted beach where always each day a granate or small bomb was found, which had to be detonated on the beach by the armee.
So because they didn't want to make the same mistake again, they have chosen a complete other win area at the seabottom, with the result that they stumbled on fine grain sand.

By the way...there is a little story to tell about these granates on the beach.

Because I had a lot of trouble with these armee guys two years ago (they tried to forbid me to sail etc), I used to take each granate that I found in the morning with me to my home.
I've cleared quite a lot of them (letting the gunpower out and removing the detonator). I ended up with a lot of wanted presents consisting of painted and /or texted fully defused granates for placing on the chimney!

By the way, all these granates and bombs on the seabottom far at sea before our village, have to do with the shooting areas for the navy at sea.
And to make everything even worse, in the dunes just next door, there was(is) an installation of a supercanon pointed at sea for testing foreign enemy munition!

And you don't want to believe it, but this canon stands 200 meter from the dome which houses the nuclear hiflux reactor in the dunes.....

and I'm their neighbour who literaly lives closest by......

Yikes. In Newport, RI we sail on Narragansett Bay, which was used for torpedo testing by the Navy. Still a bunch of those down there.

As for government waste on engineering projects, it's tough to beat the Big Dig (highway construction) in Boston, MA.

And, after the Three Mile Island incident, no nuclear reactors have really been approved. Which just means that the ones that we do have are really, really old...

Mike