We woke up this morning when the chicken bus left for the only run of the day at 5 a.m. Going back to sleep we woke up to the 7 a.m. chicken outside. We walked down to Oscars soda where we had a breakfast of scrambled eggs, rice, black beans and a round fried thing that resembled a pancake but could be opened up and filled with the other ingredients.
Coming back to the unit we prepared for our day on the beach. Camera, bathing suits and a liter of water. This turned out to be not nearly enough and I got so dehydrated I was spitting dust. We got to the beach and I got a shot of all the turtle egg shells that litter the beach. We headed North away from the sun so I could get better pictures and came across two sets of turtle tracks where they had come up during the night. Lots of vultures today and several flocks of pelicans. We made it as far as we could go on the beach and got some great shots of the waves crashing onto the rocks. Not many shells on this beach but Jo found a few sand dollars. The beach is black sand and pretty easy to walk on. The surf is a killer and not designed for swimming. I went in a little way just to cool off but you really had to watch the undertow.
Jo figures we waked about 7 miles today. She's a walker and I'm not so I'll take her word for it.
On our way back at 5 to 11 I heard Jo say "there's one"! Wow and it was a green turtle heading inland. Boy that got the blood pumping! It was about 150' from the water which was at low tide. I ran up to a large piece of driftwood as it continued for another 25-50' and then when it began starting to dig I got up behind it. I didn't want to disrupt it and I don't think it was aware of me. It began digging mainly with it's front flippers but the actual hole was done by the big rear flippers which also contain a toenail. It stopped using the front ones after just a few minutes. The sand kicked up by the rear ones flew right over it's head with some landing on it's head. She also dug up some what appeared to be fertile eggs along with the sand. We've been told that they allow some of the people to recover eggs for eating at the peak of the egg laying in Nov. as there are so many eggs being laid that the first ones from the previous turtles are destroyed by the turtles following them. Having seen the picture Oscar showed us last night it's easy to believe
When it reached the maximum depth it could achieve the hole was completely covered by the shell. It kind of backed into it towards where I was standing. This made it impossible to get a shot of the eggs but you could tell she was depositing them as she'd raise her head and almost as if she was inhaling and then exhale. This was repeated for about 10 minutes. The hole also took about 10 minutes. When she was done she began filling and tamping down the sand into the hole. As the hole filled up she rocked back and forth applying her weight to the sand to further compact it. When it was pretty much completely filled she began moving in a clockwise motion still spreading sand and completely camaflouging the nest. Once she'd finished that she was in a position to continue on to the water.
She was pretty exhausted at this point. For the first 20' she really moved but then began stopping for a breather ever 10' or so. Even when the waves were almost three feet away she paused once again to have a final rest. Watching her disappear into the surf was a sight neither of us will ever forget. It made us wonder how many years it's been since her mother did the same thing and 45 days later out of all the other eggs, she had survived to repeat the process.
It's hard to believe our good fortune over the last 12 days to have seen some of the things we have.
I couldn't wait to get back here to download the pics and videos to see what we'd captured. I was completely dehydrated by that time as the single bottle of water didn't come close to providing what I needed let alone the both of us.
Everything here is closed today as it's Sunday. We're hoping Oscar opens up his soda again so we can eat supper but if not no problem. Eating down here isn't a priority for some reason and even after not eating all day we're still good to go. We're now sitting outside the unit. Jo is working on her journal and I'm editing pictures and typing. I've found a thing on my camera that I thought was a burst which saves the last picture but this one saves all the pictures as long as you hold the button down. It's really great as it's almost like a video but I can correct the horizontal on the seascape pictures (and I've got the ocean running off the map on every picture) It also enabled me to catch more of the action in photos as the turtle dug the nest rather than using all video.
While sitting out here Jo again spotted a 3' bluish iguana in the shrubs. This was followed up by a beautiful green one . I got some great shots as the big one feasted on the leaves of the shrubs and they will be downloaded later tonight. Right now it's time to head back to Oscars to see if he's open. Just as we left the beach from taking sunset pictures Oscar and his family drove up and asked us if we'd like supper. He said come back in 10 minutes which we did with enthusiasm as we thought we'd go to bed w/o any. Everything here is closed on Sunday and if we'd arrived today instead of yesterday we'd have slept standing up.
Oscar made us a cheeseburg and a taco with a huge salad of cole slaw. We washed that down with tamarindo juice. We asked him about the large fruit hanging off the leafless tree out back. It's called a hickora tree and the fruit is inedible except in Nicaragua. He showed us a strainer/collindor that was made from the nut. It looked like a regular wooden bowl only thinner and had countless holes punched into it.
We brought up the subject of hitching a ride to Nasara so we wouldn't have to go all the way back to Santa Cruz. He said "I'm also a taxi driver" He then gave us his prices to Nasara and onward to Sanara. It's cheaper than a regular cab and will save us a whole day so it's a go. We'll go there for breakfast and then strike out to Nasara and possibly Sanara. We think both places have internet so I'm hoping I can copy these drafts and paste them right into the blog.
Yesterday (I'm typing this on the morning of the 21st) I took well over 500 pics which brought the total count up around 1500 so before turning in I burned a dvd of 1044 pics incl. vids.
One more thing to note the roads are very dusty so people living along them keep their windows closed during the day. In the evening we've seen people out watering down the road so they can leave their windows open during the night.
Another great day. This trip is full of surprises and all of them are great!
LINK OF THE DAY
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=26226&l=6935c&id=680056043
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=26227&l=0fe6d&id=680056043
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=26228&l=b982a&id=680056043
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=26230&l=860e5&id=680056043


Al Cotton