Day 2 : June 10th
Note to Readers: This blog was written by three separate authors as they reflected on their experiences on Sunday, June 10. As a result, the entries are not sequential, but reflect the thoughts of each individual girl. You will also see that we encountered heavy rain and thunderstorms during our time at Pacuare. Please be assured that we followed the station’s safety protocols throughout the storms.
Pura vida mae (pure life dude)! Wake up call was at 6:30 am and we (all 17 of us with 3 bathrooms!) got ready with great speed for the 7:15 breakfast. Since we got ready early we had more than enough time to load the bus. Our driver, Miguel, efficiently loaded our bags on top of the bus while balancing himself on its roof. To pass time on our three hour ride, Alicia and Randall started us off with a name game. We went around saying our name followed by an animal with the same initial letter. Then each person repeated the previous person’s animal and name. Poor Emily had to repeat everyone’s animal and name. By then we had entered a winding road through mountains which are part of a national forest called Braulio Carrillo. After an hour or so on the bus, we stopped for a bathroom and snack break where we enjoyed authentic empanadas filled with queso (cheese), pollo (chicken) or carne (meat). A little while later we reached a village where we were surprised to see an iguana scampering across the road! Don’t worry - it made it across safely! This village held many surprises because soon after we came across a Costa Rican Chinese food restaurant for lunch! Our lunch break took longer than expected (2 hours!) but it was worth the experience. We then passed through a large banana plantation where we heard stories about how they originated through the foundation of railroads.
The heat and humidity accompanied us through the whole three-hour ride, we could not have survived the journey without the fresh air provided by the open windows. We then arrived at the location of the boat, but since we were late we had to wait a while until it came. Finally when the boats arrived we loaded the luggage and were on the way to the Pacuare Turtle Reserve. In the 20 minute journey we saw monkeys and kept an eye out for alligators! After we docked we used wooden carts to transport the bags to the cabins through the jungle filled with snakes, frogs and BUGS. We regrouped for a tete-a-tete (shout out to Mrs. G!) to discuss our plans for the evening and signed up for the night-time turtle patrolling, which included shifts from 8-12 pm, 10 pm-2 am, 12-4 m. Soon after we enjoyed a simple Costa Rican dinner consisting of rice with a bean stew and salad (the only time we can actually eat it)! With our stomachs full the first group set off on their journey.
– Rodina, Polly, Ayesha, Bernadine, Aisha.
At precisely 7:45 pm, the first group met outside the dining hall in preparation for whatever awaited us. Five Holton girls, in addition to Dr. Wulff and Randall, headed to the beach with a marine biologist and the director of the southern Pacuare Reserve, Alvaro. Moments after we began our journey into the dark, it began to pour. We were not able to use headlamps because the turtles confuse the light with the light of the moon. For safety reasons, everyone was asked to have a buddy and make sure that no one got left behind; Rodina and I took this assignment very seriously as we held hands until our return to the reserve. At first the lightning and thunder startled us, but we quickly became accustomed to our surroundings. On our way back from the mid-way point, lightning seemed to strike very close to where we were walking. It was quite scary because we couldn’t see well for the next 30 seconds. After about 2 hours without seeing much besides the waves of the ocean and random debris, our leaders asked us to wait as they walked towards a dark spot on the sand; I have no clue how they were able to spot the turtle from so far away! Once the leaders ok’d us to approach, we sat around a female leatherback turtle as she dug a hole for her nest and laid her eggs. I was given the privilege to be the designated egg counter – I crouched down on my hands and knees as the marine biologists held her back fins apart so I could count the tiny infertile eggs (17) as she kept track of the total number (78). As the turtle finished laying her eggs and began refilling her nest with sand, the leaders took measurements and examined her for any injuries. All in all, we spent about an hour observing before we completed the final stretch of the trek. Drenched and tired, we returned in 2 lines, ready for bed!
--- Ayesha
Hi everybody at home! What follows is an entry, which I wrote around 8 AM this morning, from my trip journal. “Here I am, showered and finally (somewhat) clean.” Last night we had quite the adventure – without actually going near the beach. I had signed up to take the “graveyard” shift on turtle patrol, from midnight to 4 AM. However, last night there was a huge thunderstorm - lightning every three seconds, thunder so loud it shook our cabin like the baseline in a dubstep song.
At around 11:40 PM, we walked over to the dining hall in the pitch-black darkness with only our headlamps (or in my case, a flashlight) to guide us. (I have never more appreciated the role of streetlamps in American society). I, having forgotten to bring a waterproof jacket, got totally and completely soaked as I walked through the buckets of rainwater that kept falling. In fact, it is still raining now – which means it’s been raining for almost 12 straight hours, a miraculous feat had it taken place back in DC.
When we got to the overhang where we were supposed to meet, we waited for a while for the biologist who was supposed to lead us. While we sat, eventually each one of us switched off our lights so that we sat quietly in the storm, watching the brief flashes of the ocean granted us by the lightning. Forgive me for the metaphor, but I thought it was as if God was taking pictures of the ocean with a flash camera. The ocean was really intense, too: tumultuous and boiling, it crashed down on the beach with a sound to rival that of the thunder. After a while it was determined that we could not patrol due to the storm. As I scurried back through the still-pouring rain, I felt bad that I couldn’t take part in the turtle patrols, and that I would get significantly more sleep than the people who had taken the other shifts. But it’s not like there’s much I can do – I can’t tell the storm to stop.”
–Alexandra
Isabel, Emily and I were sleeping soundly and there was a rat-a-tat on the door. Alicia was knocking on the door of our cabin to wake us up for the 2nd shift of the turtle watch. I woke up immediately, but it took a little bit to wake Isabel (also on the 2nd night watch). When Alicia succeeded in waking Isabel, she got up quickly and forgot where she was. At that time, it was pitch black and raining steadily. Isabel and I waited outside our cabin until everyone had gathered. We all walked together to the dining room where we waited for a couple of minutes for the marine biologist, Rocio, to come. After Rocio showed us her material for the walk, we all turned off our headlamps and blindly followed Rocio onto the beach.
A couple of minutes later, we saw a couple of blinks in the distance, signaling that a biologist found a turtle. We approached the biologist and she was with the first group. The turtle was massive and it was laying such small eggs! It was truly a magnificent sight. Since another group found the turtle, we moved on with our walk. Isabel and I were holding hands the whole time while we were walking. It felt like we were on a treadmill, walking and walking, but not knowing where we are going. The sounds of the ocean were soothing and I closed my eyes for a little bit (it was dark enough that I did not know if my eyes were open or closed). Then BOOM! – a huge clap of thunder sounded and the lightening was blinding. We reached the half-way mark and we went under a half-tarp for shelter. The storm had gotten worse and we needed to seek shelter. Rosio had cookies and we eagerly ate them. After we were done eating we sat quietly waiting for something bad to happen. We watched in the distance the lightning storm and the heard the booming thunder. The lightening was so blinding that I saw two! Isabel and I were holding each other waiting for another blinding strike. Then I suggested that we should play a game. So we played the name game until we got tired. I don’t know if I was really scared or I was feeding off of other people’s fear. Rosio then said that we should leave and not go through the beach trail because the lightening might strike someone on the beach. So we trudged through the jungle in the heavy rain for 1.5 km to the Pacuare Reserve! The journey was scary, but helpful in pushing my own limits. I knew that I was in a precarious situation, but I was surprisingly calm. If I were to hear such an event, I would be certain that I would have freaked out. Not being scared, being calm, focusing on the positive and being comfortable with my surroundings definitely opened my eyes to a new me. I am stronger than I ever thought and when faced with a challenge, I rise up to it and come out tougher and experienced, ready for anything that pops up. I had a good night sleep after my adventure.
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