I became fascinated with sea turtles as a child after watching a wildlife documentary and saw footage of the little hatchlings scrambling towards the ocean. It seems impossible not to root for such tiny creatures, so determined, yet facing such overwhelming challenges. Within the first few minutes of life they must dig themselves out of a underground cave, instinctively find their way to shore and escape capture by their many predators on land and in the water. In the end, less than 1 in 1,000 hatchlings will survive to adulthood. It became my childhood dream to witness this adorable pilgrimage first hand! Imagine my delight when we saw a handful of hatchlings our first night on Heron Island. This was only the beginning. The following day, while standing on the beach, I found myself amid an entire nest of at least 50 hatchlings as they emerged from the dunes and hurried past me toward the water. Paul was snorkeling close to shore at the time and came face to face with a few. It was an incredible experience! We were excited to find ourselves in the middle of another hatching that night.
Every night of our trip we walked around the island at dusk. This was a great time to spot mature female turtles making their way up the beach to the dunes to nest and lay eggs. The nesting process is time consuming and labour intensive. Our second night, we joined a guided walk and saw a 50 year old turtle laying eggs, which are similar in size to golf balls. It takes about 65 days for the eggs to hatch and between 25 and 30 years for the turtles to reach maturity and begin laying eggs of their own.
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