Last Saturday in Florida

Saturday had more cool tours of all the launch pads ever. This Merritt Island is just chock full of them. KSC is truly the spaceport. We drove around for a few hours, saw the very powerful Apollo 1 site, then other very historic launch sites (including Alan Shepard's first flight) and went to the Saturn V center, which rocks a lot. Along the way I got to see an osprey in flight carrying what I guess to be a large fish as well as a gopher tortoise crossing the road and some bottleneck dolphins playing in the water.

After the tours, several of the RAs headed back to theme parks, as was their theme for the trip. My theme was beach. After some Quiznos (turkey bacon guacamole is delicious, especially with French dressing) we spent another couple hours playing in the waves. We watched the sunset while we were in the water, then headed back to the dorms to shower and make further evening plans. We were all excited about getting to stay in Florida for another two days with no obligation and free housing.

When we first got to Florida, I'd been talking about things I'd like to do in while I'm there, and randomly asked the (awesome) native Floridian, Laura (who had arranged most of this trip and totally got us hooked up with the tours), if it was time for the little sea turtles to hatch. She had no idea and said that it would probably be a closed area if they were. Awwww… disappointed Jessica. I guess I'll settle for seeing an alligator, then.

Around midnight that night last night six of us were looking for a stretch of beach on which to lay out and watch the stars. We drove down the Melbourne island and saw a group of cars parked at a place that actually had a restroom. We unloaded all our stuff, and started carrying it to where the party was. We rounded a corner with the group and a little kid comes skipping down some stairs. It's very late for children to be out. Turns out there was totally a turtle hatching going on, but it was ending and people were leaving, but we were looking for somewhere more quiet. So we regroup, get back in the car and head south down the beach road. A few miles down we find a similar place with a restroom and only one other car out front. We get out, scout ahead, and there were three girls with headlamps and calipers who are around another hatching place where real live tiny flappy loggerhead turtles are emerging from the sand. This was one of the coolest things ever. We watch until about fifty of them come out (the last one being terribly dramatic with his flappy-flapping trying to get up out of the hole. He took at least five minutes to get out) and made their ways into the ocean. All along, we constantly asked questions of the three undergrads who are doing research, just like this was a planned activity of the Academy.

Luckily, there weren't tons of those evil birds around that are always on the specials pecking and eating the tiny adorable turtles. They just beelined to the water and every one of them that made it to the surface of the sand made it to the water. Yay! The gals headed off after it was clear that
this was the last one, and we went back to the car to get our supplies. About 30 meters down the beach in each direction there were other groups of people, one was a couple and one was a group of people obviously drinking. Neither were interested in the little turtles, sadly. We gave the groups a good amount of distance and then set up a base, toasting to the little guys who had just emerged in front of us and wishing them luck and a chance of adulthood better than the typical 1 in 1000. About an hour into it, we had people wandering the beach (it was a near-full moon, and plenty bright, so we could see people weren't getting lost), and one of the guys came jogging back because there was another hatching group coming out, this one not staggered, but a mass exodus. We jogged over, carefully watching our step, and there were about thirty of them all at once heading to the water. I finally gave in after holding back from not touching them, and put down my hand so that one could flappy flop over it. Didn't disturb it. I was like another landscaping feature, and it was so very cool. I'm giggling to think about it.

We didn't take pictures, but here's some websites that have pictures of things that we saw.

So at this point we're feeling like we've pretty much had the best day ever... Florida, space stuff, baby turtles, and beach partying. We settle back into the blankets and talk some more. The same guy as before is walking again. He comes back in a hurry again and says that he saw a giant dark mound in the sand, went to check it out, and it's… a big huge momma turtle, coming in to lay her eggs. How cool is that!?! We watch (from a respectful distance) her make her way up the beach, turn around, and start plopping the eggs (usually 70-150 or so, I believe the gal had said). We watched her for a while, and turned around and another one was coming up between us and our setup down the beach. We watched until one started pushing massive amounts of sand through the air and into the hole, then we saw her head back to the ocean, and walked with her on either side (at a distance).

This was seriously one of the best nights ever.

But I still haven't seen an alligator yet.