Winners and Oozers

Here’s mud in your eye. And your hair. And your fingernails. And your shirt. And your . . .

A few hundred participants in the third annual Mud Sling Festival at Mission San Juan Capistrano found that oozing dirt can creep into the most uncomfortable places.

Some of the adobe clay did, however, end up where it was supposed to--the walls of the 206-year-old soldiers’ barracks.

Children, parents and corporate sponsors dedicated hours Saturday to the preservation project, scaling scaffolds, dipping hands or brushes into wheelbarrows of mud and slathering the stuff onto the 3-foot-thick walls.

The daylong event kept facilities manager Richard Calef busy, mixing a modern recipe of 40 shovels of soil, sand and straw to every shovel of cement. Offering directions was John Loomis of the 30th Street Architects in Newport Beach, who’s repairing the mission’s Great Stone Church.

Mission spokesman Jim Graves says it’s a springtime tradition--”a rite of renewal after the rains.

“We need to replace what has been washed away,” he explained. “Some slingers got mud up to their elbow and beyond--their clothes, faces, you name it. A couple had mud all over their glasses. It’s a fun time.”

The project continues at the mission this Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. It’s part of the countywide Volunteer Connection Day, and anyone who wants to help can jump in.

“We’re hoping that schoolchildren come out to help, either organized by teachers or just coming out with their parents. Maybe they can get extra credit at school,” Graves said. “Everyone needs to learn the importance of preserving the mission. It’s our link to the day-to-day life of our past.”

Admission fees ($5 for adults; $4 for seniors and children 3-12) benefit the mission’s preservation efforts. Call (714) 248-2048.