The other night, we experienced something truly magical. We set off into the night in a Turismo shuttle, and headed north to a secluded beach in the Parque Nacional Marino Las Baulas De Guanacaste. Our guide, Welfrom (who took us out on our croc hunt the other week) led us to the beach, where we immediately found a mama turtle heading back to the water from the sand dunes. Our guide explained that she had tried to find a spot to lay her eggs, but turned around instead, because something wasn’t right – these turtles are known to dig many holes before they actually lay their nest of eggs. We slowly formed a semi-circle behind her as she crawled back, and watched under the light of the moon as she made her way back to the ocean.
We were in the company of a “Tortuga Negra” – a black sea turtle, which happens to be in prime egg-laying season right now in Costa Rica. These turtles can weigh up to 220lbs, and can be about a meter long and are identified by their teardrop shaped shell and dark grey/green colouring, and are also on the endangered species list.
We were so fortunate to see almost the entire process of the egg laying – which typically takes anywhere from 2-4 hours. The Tortuga Negra crawls up the beach and finds a safe spot, then digs a large hole, where she then digs an even deeper hole with her back fins (which are incredibly dexterous, as you can see in the video documentation). Our guide told us, that at this point the mama goes into a trance-like state where almost nothing will bother her – because shes too busy concentrating on popping out 70-100 eggs! And this all takes time. Remember. This is all at the speed of a turtle. Its beautifully slow – yet powerful and graceful.
This was such an intimate experience, and we were thrilled to share it with our good friends Grant and Megan, and our new friends from Seattle, WA – Janice, Marianne and Nick. In respect for the Tortuga Negra, we were unable to take any photographs with flash, but we’ve put together a video we filmed that shows the turtle going back to the ocean, and the second turtle digging and laying her eggs – its almost a 6 minute clip so be patient!
pura vida!!
twogirlsonepup 