We have loved seeing the Scarlet Ibises fly across the Caroni swamp and daily watch brown pelicans dive into the ocean but this morning we saw the coolest thing we have seen in a long time. Leatherback turtles laying eggs and heading back to sea.
At 9:00 last night we went out to the beach with a guide who explained that leatherbacks which can grow to 7 feet long and 3 feet wide and 800 pounds lay eggs 8-10 times per season - laying 80 eggs each time in the hopes that one or two will survive to adulthood. The females come onto the beach, dig a deep hole, lay the eggs and then head back to shore.
We watched for a couple hours last night and then I got up at 5:30 this morning to watch the sun rise and to take some pictures. In the daylight there were only a few turtles (and a lot of well-fed egg-eating vultures) but at night they get 300 turtles and at times we were startled that while we were watching on turtle that another had come up to shore right next to us (remember these are the size of overstuffed armchair).
We also saw some hatched baby turtles which were unbelievable cute and had already survived long odds by hatching.
