As soon as the sun came up, around a dozen volunteers got to work Thursday placing scarecrows around Cambria and San Simeon.
While some of the scarecrows are new to the Cambria Scarecrow Festival, many of them are repurposed.
“These all were other scarecrows. I recarved their face and stuff,” said Kim Miller, Cambria Scarecrow Festival Social Media Coordinator.
Miller created scarecrows resembling Kiss band members.
“These guys take me about six months. Each one took me about two and a half months because I totally made the costume myself,” Miller explained.
Gail Hammerschmidt, the festival's storage coordinator, also created multiple scarecrows, repurposing one into an athlete as a tribute to her mom.
"She wears number 13 which was my number in high school and college sports. Like most women athletes, she plays hurt as you will notice. She’s a softball player and she can do it all. She’s hurt, catching a fly, but she still has time to blow a bubble so that says it all for women athletes,” Hammerschmidt said.
Preparations for the annual festival began in January with the creators paying very close attention to detail.
“For the hair, for the messy buns you take the plaster cloth when it's wet and you twist and curl it and make curlicues and you get all your fine details,” Hammerschmidt said.
There are 211 scarecrows placed around Cambria and San Simeon. For a map of where each one is located, click here.
“Cookie Croc was originally a crocodile for the pirates a couple of years ago and the artist decided to add a cookie and therefore Cookie Croc,” said Patty Wallace Rixman, Cambria Scarecrow Festival President.
The scarecrows will be up through October 31.
