Costa Rica: The Turtle Hatch (cont.)

And because we cannot afford another hour, we continue on until we find a female who is in the midst of laying eggs. Another group’s tour guide shines a red light on her tail. She balances all 300 pounds of herself over the hole. Every few moments, she pushes herself up a bit with her back feet; her tail droops; and – plop – out drop one or two or three soft eggs, followed by a small amount of liquid. Her occasional soft sighs are nowhere near as loud as the chirps of the vociferous geckos back at the lodge.

We turn around, still surveying the sand beneath us, determined to find babies. On our way, we pass a mother heading back to the sea. We stand behind her, watching as she shuffles out to the water, using the white caps to guide her as the children she will never meet will do, weeks later. Two people from another tour group stand too close. Her stomach feels the vibrations of their feet in the sand, and she stops walking, veers away.  Their guide snaps at them, tells them to back off; and, reassured, she continues on toward the water, where she will spend most of her life alone.

As we watch the mother’s departure, Fernando leans close and whispers, “Babies!” He’s found turtles hatching from their eggs, hefting their way out from the hole and struggling out to sea. My annoyance at the other tourists dissipates. Their presence there that night will help ensure that at least this batch of babies won’t be eaten by jaguars.

The babies are tiny – just two inches long – and difficult to spot on the dark beach. When we approach the hole, every last one of us gasps in disbelief. Dozens of turtles emerge from the nest, flapping their little fins, beginning their arduous lives. Fernando shines his red light before one, leading him out to the water. Statistically, one or two out of the 125 or so of them will survive.  We are told not to touch them; they need these moments to build their strength and our well-meaning help could mean their demise.

Speechless, we stand and watch the hatchlings’ struggle. We cannot hope to witness something like this again.

Soon Fernando tells us it is time to leave; we must not miss the boat that awaits us back at the dock. He suggests we take the path through the jungle; we will be able to move faster on dirt than on sand. As we follow him up to the jungle path, I am thinking about those jaguars that, slinking around sight unseen, manage to eat the baby turtles.

Fernando leads with his flashlight, hands another flashlight to a man, who takes up the rear. I am in the middle, nearly walking on Fernando’s ankles because I have no light of my own and can barely make out the roots that rise up under my feet, or the monstrous leaves that descend from the darkness. It is pitch black and creepily thrilling. Howler monkeys’ throaty rumbles are occasionally interrupted by the croaking of frogs, which sound as big as crocodiles. We are silent, except for the crunch of our feet on the trail. An occasional bird calls out from the bushes and trees surrounding us on either side, and the muted crashing of waves hails from our right. Our single file walk through the slick wet forest reminds me of the opening scene of The Poisonwood Bible, in which the five Price females emerge from the Congan jungle. I am excited and scared but also somewhat cushioned by and cocooned in my state of disbelief.

Our pace borders on jog-walking; and even though I’m sweating, I pull on my jacket to avoid getting besieged by mosquitoes or brushing up against the poison ivy that has already attacked one of my fellow travelers. At last we reach the village, pick our way through its dirt roads, passing the thumping dance club with the people and dogs that mill around outside, to the dock.  We bid Fernando farewell and watch him meander back to the club. It is a night’s work for him; he will see more turtles as soon as the very next day.

But as we step onto the boat and leave the dock, we awake from the dream, shake our heads, and realize that we have unearthed a bit of our selves on that dark and magical Caribbean beach, the selves that can suspend disbelief and sit in awe as a turtle giantess does what turtles before her have done for thousands of years.

The boat’s light illuminates a narrow stretch of water before us. Behind us is Tortuguero, where a man dances to Calypso music in a canal-side club, accompanied by the occasional barking of dogs and distant roar of monkeys. And somewhere in the expanse of sea that runs parallel to our waterway, green sea turtles dive deep into the quietude of the water.

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