Day 89 June 1st - Adiós

Farewell Costa Rica, you have been fun!

Day 88 May 31st - Last Night

Tonight is the last night of the project. It has been an amazing time, I will miss everyone!!

Day 87 May 30th - Last Patrol

Our last Patrol :-(

Day 86 May 29th - Gran Tormenta

This isn't my photo but we have had some crazy storms like this one lately!!! On  Monday night I was terrified of the storm and we had to  stop patrol early because it was so close!! There is another storm tonight and luckily I have the night off!!!

Day 85 May 28th - Another Day in Paradise

Morning nest check, Sunbathing, Relaxing, Night Patrol....... Just another day in Paradise!

Day 84 May 27th - Banner Painting

Even though we will be gone by the time they hold the Big Beach Clean on the 5th of June we spent the afternoon painting the banners for it so we could get them up around town.

Day 83 May 26th - Beach Clean

Today we had a group of school students from San Jose help us with a beach clean. We had to finish early as  the weather decided to turn from a beautiful sunny day into a Tropical storm!!! I'm surprised we didn't blow away!!!

Day 82 May 25th - Technology Hates Me!!!

As you can see the light is not showing my computer as charging even though it is plugged in!!! Turns out the power plug is broken :-( Luckily for me we have a laptop here we can all use.

Day 81 May 24th - International Biodiversity Day

For International Biodiversity Day we showed the village the videos the kids had been working on. We also showed a photo montage from the beach project we had with the little kids. We even had refreshments of popcorn and fizzy drink! 

Day 80 May 23rd - San Francisco

Today we went to San Francisco, a small town across the river, to give the school kids a presentation. We figured they were probally bored of hearing about turtles so we taught them about the countries we came from and some of the animals found in them. 

Day 79 May 22nd - Leatherback Paradise

Last nights patrol was amazing!! Maddie, Claire and I were treated to our first turtle five minutes into patrol! We were lucky enough to see 5 Leatherbacks on Patrol. We could definitely see how they have had move than 800 Leatherbacks this season!!! Back to STC station today and our less abundant nesting beach!!

Day 78 May 21st - Pacuare

Today we are going to Pacuare, another project about 2hrs away by boat. They have a huge Leatherback nesting population and can get up to 30 turtles in one night!!! Despite having caught Cata's illness I can't wait for patrol tonight!!

Day 77 May 20th - Hatchlings and Excavations

Today Fer and I had the long track survey and we were lucky enough to see HATCHLINGS!!!!! We have also had our first marked nest hatch a few days ago so we have our first excavation this afternoon! Can't wait!!

Day 76 May 19th - Farewell Emma

Emma is our Scientific Director and comes to visit us occasionally. She's been supervising us for the last week while Cata has been on holiday. It's time for her to leave though and this is the last time we will see her before the end of the project! :-(

Day 75 May 18th - Farewell to our Last Eco-Volunteer

Today is Rachel's (our last eco-volunteer) last day! She has been with us two weeks and is flying out bright and early tomorrow morning. She was lucky enough to see a hawksbill as well as a leatherback.

Day 74 May 17th - Crepes

Angela had a serious craving for a banana split today and with just a little persuading she convinced all the girls it was a good idea! Unfortunately the usual place was closed so we went to Budda Bar and ended up having crepes instead. They were absolutely delicious!!!! I think I have definitely cancelled out all the walking we do!!!!

Day 73 May 16th - Cano Palma

We went for a visit this morning to one of the other nearby research stations. They are located in the middle of the jungle on the other side of the river. As well as turtle work they run a lot of other research projects including plant studies, and mammal studies. It was started by a Canadian in 1991 who had been a research assistant with STC.

Day 72 May 15th - Ceviche

After hearing all about how amazing ceviche is from Angela for the last two and a half months, wild ginger finally had the right type of fish to make it. So we went out to try it as a pre dinner snack! Turns out it is just as delicious as Angela  said!!

Day 71 May 14th - MADDIE!!!!

I have a Maddie filled day today!! We have track survey together this morning and patrol together tonight!! We seem to be a lucky team because we got a Hawksbill nesting on night patrol, and she wasn't tagged! 

Day 70 May 13th - Cocktails

We have the night off tonight and we are helping Randall celebrate his birthday (even though it was yesterday). Homemade Pina Coladas among other cocktails seem a good choice to me!!

Day 69 May 12th - Another Birthday!

Today we had our third birthday celebration. Today is our station manager Randall's birthday. 

Day 68 May 11th - Paradise

Today was a beautiful sunny relaxing day. I had the entire day off so I could relax, enjoy and catch up on sleep!!! This is the beautiful sunset we got to watch as we were doing yoga!! 

Day 67 May 10th - Run Down

Cata is going on holiday so we have Emma (the Scientific Director) coming to look after us for the next few weeks.  She arrived today and all of us were able to go out for a lovely dinner! I had Run Down a really yummy Caribbean dish with fish, coconut milk, plantain and other root veggies. There was soooooo much food I couldn't finish it, and night patrol afterwards was a definite struggle!!!! 

Day 66 May 9th - Te Odio Purrujas!!!!

This photo was not taken by me, but I HATE SAND FLEAS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Day 65 May 8th - Swimming Fun

It's been really hot lately so Cata organised a swimming trip to one of the hotels for this afternoon so we could use their swimming pool. Angela took her underwater camera so we had heaps of fun taking entertaining photos underwater!

Day 64 May 7th - Canoeing

Thanks to Victor befriending almost everyone in Tortuguero we were able to use some of the canoes from one of the hotels. So we decided to go on a canoeing trip into the national park to watch the sunset. It was a really lovely evening!

Day 63 May 6th - Yoga

After talking about it for weeks we finally got round to having our yoga session in a very peaceful setting beside the river with Maddie our very own personal instructor! It was really fun and is now going to be a daily session, hopefully we can get the whole station involved!!!

Day 62 May 5th - Rico Papi

Today I had a pretty free afternoon so I decided to practice my spanish in the sun. A few of the others drifted over after they had finished with more training for the kids. I learnt some very useful phrases!!!

Day 61 May 4th - Aprender Más

The kids from Barra Colorado school, that we gave a presentation to, arrived today to do night patrols with us for the next two night. We are training them this afternoon so they are all ready to patrol tonight!

Day 60 May 3rd - Happy Birthday Claire!

Today was a good day!! First of all it was Claire's birthday so we went out for cake and ice cream, YUM! The most exciting part though was night patrol. We got a Leatherback after days of nothing, and we had a group of journalist on the beach as well. They were from the La Nacion, a Costa Rican newspaper, and had permits from the park to take pictures. They got lots of shots of the turtle as well as shots of Victor and I working with the turtle! The article is meant to be out on June 16th!!

Day 59 May 2nd - Long Track Survey

Today Raul and I had the long tracy survey. We were lucky enough to have a nice cool overcast morning. Somehow we stayed in the eye of the storm most of the 12.5 miles! There seemed to be torrential rain everywhere but where we were!! We were eaten alive by sand fleas and now my legs are sooooo itchy!!! We only got about 5 turtle tracks!! But there were a lot of Jaguar tracks. There was the usual large male and also a mother with her two cubs. There prints were so small and cute!!

Day 58 May 1st - Canal Tour Take 2

Barbara, one of the guides, told us she could take us out on her canoe tour whenever she had spaces and this morning she had two free spots. I had night patrol last night so instead of sleeping afterwards I drank lots of coffee and at 5am Victor and I went on the Canoe trip. We saw lots of wildlife despite the rain and were lucky enough to see two Great Green Macaws. We also saw river otters and toucans as well as the usual monkeys, caymans, and other pretty birds.

Day 57 April 30th - Banana Splits

We had a free afternoon so we decided to finally go get a banana split from one of the cafes in the village. We had hear how amazing they were from Angela and they certainly did not disappoint!!!

Day 56 April 29th - New Eco-Volunteers

Today we got a new group of 17 eco-volunteers from Florida. Fer and I trained them before their first patrol tonight.

Day 55 April 28th - Canopy

We went on a canopy tour (zip lining) this morning. It was great fun, not the best time to remember I'm scared of heights though!

Day 54 April 27th - Cariari

Seeing as there is no bank or post facilities in Tortuguero Maddie and I went on an exciting cash and mail expedition to Cariari today. We made a day of it seeing as it was a boat and bus ride away. We had the strangest chinese I have ever had for lunch and we did a bit of shopping too! We were very tempted to get these jaguar pants, we thought they might confuse the jaguar on night patrol!!!

Day 53 April 26th - These Boots Were Made for Walking

I think I'm starting to get quite fit from all the walking we seem to be doing. This morning I had track survey (the short one mind, only 6 miles) and tonight night patrol. Last week I decided to count how many miles I walked on shifts and it came to a grand total of 63 miles!

Day 52 25th April - Presentación en Español

Today we went to Colorado (another village about an hour down the river) and gave a presentation to the older kids at the local high school all about leatherbacks and the work we do. We had a section each, mine was the first bit about turtle morphology. Only snag was they only speak spanish!! So you guessed it I gave my first spanish presentation!! Afterwards we went to a Lagoon that is meant to be good for spotting manatees, we searched for ages but unfortunately didn't see any.

Day 51 April 24th - Jaguar

(This photo was taken by one of the GVI volunteers at Jalova on a morning patrol) I haven't seen a turtle in a while and I am starting to forget what they look like! Mind you night patrols are far from boring!! Tonight we heard a monkey getting killed by a jaguar  and not long after that we could smell the jaguar. On our way back we discovered he had been following us, his paw prints even followed Raul as he went to check the mile markers!

Day 50 April 23rd - Bikes

One of the eco volunteers who stayed a week with use was generous enough to buy us two brand new bikes to help make shifts like nest checking that much easier! Thank you so much Jessica!!!

Day 49 April 22nd - Earth Day

I started the day in the nicest way possible, a lovely canoe trip through the jungle. We set off at 5:30 this morning (A nice early start after night patrol last night!) and spend a peaceful three hours paddling through the canals and spotting wildlife. I can't think of any better way to start a sunday (and Earth Day)!  

Day 48 April 21st - Group Photo

Now that we finally have our STC shirts we had to get a group shot looking official! As well as our very serious group shot we decided to take the obligatory jumping shot. Turns out its not easy to get 8 people to all jump at the same time!

Day 47 April 20th - Jungle Adventures

Angela and I had a really funny afternoon exploring one of the "jungle" paths this afternoon. It was a labyrinth but we took some really funny photos. Afterwards we went in to the village for a milkshake and pizza with some of the others. It was a fun afternoon!

Day 46 April 19th - Filming

After a very rocky start to our movie project with the High School kids today was our first day of filming. Our group got lots of scenes done and had a fun time. Can't wait to see the end result.

Day 45 April 18th - Beach Murals

On the 22nd it's Earth Day and today we have activities planed with the local school kids to make them aware of Earth Day and the importance of looking after the environment. We have groups in both the morning and the afternoon that we are taking down to the beach. We are going to  make murals out of both natural products and garbage to show them what should be on the beach and what shouldn't. 

Day 44 April 17th - Caribbean Night

Elias and I had the 12 mile track survey this morning and wow was it busy!! Turns out the turtles  are crazy!! We had so many new tracks and nests after last nights storm. Those of us with the night off are going to the caribbean themed night at the Taverna tonight.