One Totally Awesome Turtle

We all stood around the giant leatherback turtle like wide-eyed little Nemos.

The thousand-pound momma had crawled up onto Grand Anse Beach to find a quiet place to bury her egg offspring. However, she must have been using an old map for her directions because she washed up right into the center of tourist town. Poor turtle.

David and I had been doing a little post-test “beaching”  with our friends and neighbors about 100 yards away, when a local man told us we could get some cool pictures just “over there.”

He wasn’t kidding.

Like a schmuck, I had forgotten to bring my camera that day. But the Fosters were there with their adorable family and they let me swipe a few of their pics from the day.

Normally each spring, the leatherbacks crawl up on the protected Lavera Beach at the very northern tip of Grenada. Conservationists run eco tours there between April and June.  However, according to the vacationing conservationist (who ended up running the impromptu show) the touristy Grand Anse Beach used to be a hot spot for turtle’s to lay their eggs. That was before all the resort hotels were built.

This momma was probably about 100 years old, she said, and stuck in her ways.

As her powerful fins started flinging sand at the gathering crowd, the conservationist added that she would lay and bury more than 100 eggs, some of them empty duds used to insulate the fertilized future turtles. After one attempt at digging a hole, momma turtle discovered that the tide was too high and the hole was getting water-logged. So she moved up and started digging again – a process that looked awfully hard and time consuming.

This poor mom probably wouldn’t be able to lay a successful batch on this beach. First, while Grenada has a great Leatherback Turtle conservation effort, they do no monitor nor patrol Grand Anse Beach. If momma lands there, she is on her own up against hundreds of tourists. Also, the beachfront is too close to the water and if high tide decided to get any higher, the eggs would be completely waterlogged.

When it looked like her next hole would take a while, we all went home to clean up and come back. But in an hour all that was left of our momma turtle was a sandy imprint. She had scooted back out to sea.

Thanks for saying hi momma turtle. Seeing you was truly amazing.