We drove most of the day until we got to Bundeburg, the sugar cane capital of Australia. We bought some soft drinks made with cane sugar and they had really interesting bottles. At the local i-site we got a tip to go see some sea turtles laying eggs. It was the beginning of the turtle egg laying season so we bought some tickets to view them at night. We arrived at dark where we went to an education centre to learn about the turtles and wait until a turtle came to shore to lay their eggs. The guides kept telling us that turtles are wild animals and that they will arrive when they are ready and not at any specific time. So we had to wait and wait, read and re-read and see a . . .
slide show at the amphitheatre until the guide finally said that a turtle had come up on shore and was about to lay her eggs. We had to walk as a group out to the beach to the site where the turtle was digging her hole. We formed a semi-circle about 1metre away and watched her finish digging her hole using her back flippers almost like hands scooping up sand. Then she started laying her eggs and the guide said that after the first 12 were laid we could shift around and form a complete circle around the turtle and she would not be disturbed. When she was done laying she filled up her hole and slowly scooched her way done to the water pausing every so often pretending that she was a rock, as if we couldn't see her. When she left the guides told us that the eggs were buried to close to the water and had to be re-located to higher ground. This was very special and doesn't happen very often. I got to re-locate 6 eggs out of 124 total. So we got to help to save an endangered species.
Birch
Birch
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