Fiesta

Everybody loves parades. Fortunately, we got out of jail and home in time for the annual sea turtle festival in Matapalo. The festival started with a parade. The Matapalo school band played.


All the local schools participated, including the Bullis students:






I helped hold the banner at the front of the line!


After the parade, everyone gathered for a program. Park Ranger Carlos Diaz was the MC, and he even sang as part of the show.


There was more music, and all the students performed skits. Some pretended to be leatherbacks and laid eggs . . .


and the Bullis students performed a skit with an intricate dance.


After the program, there was lots of food! (my favorite part)


But those research students can't take a party. Look at them napping after the festival!


I was tired too, though. I was ready for bed and the trip home.

Mudpots, Volcanoes, and Jail

Hey Swatchy! Remember on my last trip to Costa Rica, when I went to the mud pots? Well, we went back with the kids from the Bullis Charter School.


The mud pots are at the Rincon de la Vieja volcano near Liberia. The heat from the volcano boils water underground and the mud bubbles up. Can you see me? I'm trying to keep the kids from crossing over the safety fence.


We had to hike through the forest and over a stream.


And we got up close and personal with some of the wildlife, like this Ctenosaur (that's an iguana to you and me)!


Afterwards, we had lunch at a local hacienda. I drank too much juice.


The next day we set out for Volcano Arenal. We stopped in Canas for pastries, and I led a tour of the town. You can see our bus in the background of this picture.


It was very windy that day, so we had a hard time getting the group photo in front of the church.


And then we saw Arenal. It's one of my favorite places. It was smoking and steaming away. Rocks were falling down the volcano, too, so no place to do a climb.


On the way back, we stopped in Liberia to use the restrooms at the police station. But some of us ended up on the wrong side of the bars:



Even me!!!!

McHatchery

I was in charge of the hatchery for an afternoon. The hatchery is a restricted place that protects the nests. No one is allowed in, because the nests are under the sand. There are so few Leatherbacks, every egg counts.



Working the hatchery involves sitting in a chair under the hot sun. All the time, you have to watch for predators like raccoons and birds that try to get in the nests.



Every twenty minutes, I had to walk over and check the nests to see if anyone was hatching. That little black thing actually holds a thermometer that monitors the temperature of the nest.



Then it was back over to the chair again. Gabi and Kim kept me company for a little while. It's a tough job, but somebody has to do it.



Gabi said I was an excellent assistant!

Just Beachy

Sun and sand equals time on the beach. See how Kim and I are keeping an eye on the kids? It's hard to keep track of so many of them.


I preferred working on my tan with some of the teachers.


Don't worry, I used plenty of sunblock!


I really needed a nap.


One problem with the beach is that the bigger people tend to kick up a lot of sand. You have to watch out.


The ocean sure looked nice, but I didn't go in. Fear of felting, you know.


Then we got a big surprise. Mr. Leatherback came up on the beach for a visit!


He wanted to see how things on the nesting beach were going. He also checked out the hatchery where we save clutches of eggs that would otherwise be washed away by the tide. We got to talking, and all became great friends.


Make sure you check out Mr. Leatherback's video of his visit to the beach!

Nest Checking

A lot of the work at Playa Grande focuses on the leatherback sea turtles and their nesting habits. Leatherbacks come ashore at night and dig deep nests in the sand with their flippers. They lay eggs and then cover the eggs back up with sand. After that, the mommy turtles go back into the ocean, leaving the eggs to develop and hatch on their own.

One of the jobs of researchers is to dig up old nests because a lot can be learned from them. Researchers count how many eggs and eggshells are in the nest. From that, they can figure out how many hatched and what happened to the eggs that did not hatch. Some eggs die shortly after they are laid, and some die shortly before the hatchlings come out. No one knows why yet.


Gabi is one of the researchers, and she explained to us all about the nests.








I had to supervise the digging, but it seemed like they were doing it right.







Then something very exciting happened! We found a hatchling!




Can you see the head?




We saved a baby leatherback sea turtle!!!!

Field Trip

One thing you have to understand about Knittah's dad, he loves a field trip. That means going out into the woods, walking around and looking at stuff. So guess what we did with the kids from the Bullis Charter School? Yep! First we hiked through mangrove swamps to look for birds, (my friends had to help me over the lava rocks)

and then we went to the beach to swim, snorkel, and check out the tide pools. Can you see me in the picture to the left? I was explaining about all the animals that live in the tide pools.





There's all kinds of cool animals that live in the tide pools. There's spiny sea urchins and snails, and bryazoans.


I got close up to the barnacles to see what they were doing.


The beach is really beautiful, with coral everywhere.










But if you look closer, you can see that the corals are dying. See how they are turning white? That means they are sick. It's the hot water from El Nino that is killing the corals. Not good. More global warming means more El Ninos and less corals!