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- Tracey Sutcliffe

Project costa rica: on a mission to save the sea turtles

The trip was fantastic. Even tho' we didn't actually see any turtles during the stay in Matapalo at the project it was by far my favorite experience of the entire trip. I loved that it was not "touristy" like Manuel Antonio or Monteverde. I enjoyed the hard work, it really made you feel like you were helping out. I loved the food! I know some of the men in the group enjoyed the food but didn't get enough of it for all the hard work they were doing, but being a had enough and it was so flavorful. Wilson, the staff, and other volunteers were wonderful, everyone was there for the same reason and all worked hard. I don't think it's a vacation all types of people would enjoy, you need to be flexible, easy going, willing to go without some luxuries (such as hot water), but worth every minute of it if you have some of those qualities.

We did work hard, as I mentioned, making sandbags, building a sandbag barrier to protect the hatchery, rock picking for the garden, kitchen cleanup duty, night patrols, and hatchery watch duties, but we also had an amazing amount of down time for ourselves. We spent most of that time on the beach! Alonzo taught us how to surf, he was amazing the entire trip! I hope to do future trips with him as the leader. Alonzo arranged for us to take a day trip to the Manuel Antonio National Park. There is a "bar" close to the project were we could relax, have a cold beer or milkshakes(!) and learn to dance the salsa and merengue.

We didn't see any turtles come to shore and lay eggs but we did find nests! We must have just missed the turtles! When a nest was found we would dig up the eggs, very, very carefully. Take a lot of data, how deep the nest was, how many eggs, weight of the eggs, measurement of the eggs, etc...then take them to the hatchery and try to re-create the nest in the hatchery. The eggs needed to be at the same depth and width etc. to ensure the proper incubation. It was exciting to be a part of the process. With the nests that are there right now the turtles should be hatching the week of Aug. 25th through Sept. 14. Believe me, I've done everything I can to try and figure out how to be there for any of those dates but flights are just to expensive to make it happen right now. I'll have to plan better next summer to ensure I'll be there for some hatchings.

I have over 600 pictures of the trip! It was a fantastic experience, it was very hard for me to come home and I can't wait to go back.

Thank you Planeterra!

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Project costa rica: on a mission to save the sea turtles

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