Mon Repos

Brilliant time last night...
Travelled to a place called 'Mon Repos' just up the coast from here where, between November and January,  heaps of endangered loggerhead turtles come up the beach to lay their eggs.  8 weeks later, the baby turtles hatch and make their way out to the ocean to continue the cycle of breeding.
Arrived early evening as the turtles generally tend to avoid the hot day times.  We had to wait until around 10.30pm-ish to hear the call from the ranger that a metre and half turtle was making her way up the beach to lay. 13 turtles in total arrived last night. What an experience.  Really amazing and such a privilege to see. Oli was enthralled.  Only about one in a thousand hatchlings reach maturity which is around 30 years and the females return to the area where they were hatched to lay their eggs.  
Interestingly, the sex of the turtle is determined by the heat of the sand! Because of the cool summer last year, 99% of the hatchlings were male which isn't good for  Mon Repos.  The wardens seemed to think that this year, because it's cool too,  will be the same, (it's COOL??? I am soooo pleased that we didn't find HOT in our first year in Oz!).
Anyways, didn't get home until gone 2am and guess what we had to do then??? Yep: get all the animals brought in and fed.  Flopped in to bed at around 3am.  Off to the bottle shop now for some wine for tonight.  You can't buy wine in supermarkets here in Oz as in the UK and have to enter a shop selling just alcohol which always makes me feel as if I have a problem.


HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ONE AND ALL!!!