Day 3: To Tortuguero

After a short night of sleep in Le Bergerac because of the noise of the city of San José and our jet lag, we got up around 05:10 to pack and get our breakfast at 05:30.
We were to be picked up at 06:00 from our hotel by the Tortuguero people to be brought all the way to the National Park. Yes, that is really early!

The breakfast was quite odd, as we were told we could get a cup of coffee, but as the chef in the kitchen would only start his shift around 6, no tea could be arranged. 🙄
The toast however was good enough to last us a few hours until we were given a proper breakfast while on route.

The small van that picked us up was half an hour late (not nice!) after which we got dropped off at a bus stop to transfer into a large coach. (Also, not nice!) Now we are trapped in a coach, on holiday, with a load of Dutch, Spanish and American tourists. (Definitely not nice!)

The driver took us on a 2.5 hour ride to a dock, where we transferred into small boats which would take us to our lodges. We are staying in Evergreen Lodge, so we found our boat and got in. The very scenic boat tour definitely is the highlight of the day so far!

After arriving at the hotel at 1pm we immediately were served lunch and were told we would go out on a tour to the nearby village of Tortuguero. The rest of the day was arranged as well, as the lodge is only accessible by water and nothing else is available for entertainment apart from the swimming pool.

Tortuguero is named after the sea turtles nesting along its beaches. Watching the turtles either hatch or lay eggs is just one of the things you need to do when you are there. Lucky for us, it is the egg laying season of the Green Turtle, and it is right at its peak at the moment.
We have been on the beach at night between 8 and 10, and have watched two of the turtles lay eggs! Also, quite a few tried to come ashore but were mainly startled by our presence and returned to the ocean. We were told they would come back later that night to lay their eggs.
Seeing them is just amazing!
And they are huge!  Tabletop sized, dark grey and mostly covered in sand, they are as mysterious as ever as they come ashore under the cover of night and leave the same way leaving behind a huge hole and about 100 buried eggs.

Tomorrow we will be in a kayak with a local guide to explore these wonderful surroundings in a much quieter fashion than today, so I’m eager to see what this will bring us!
Oh: weather wise it is not ok: it is reaching about 35 degrees with high humidity. Not Maarten proof by any means!
Let’s just hope it does not start raining, and all should be well.