Adventures On the Road

Today I was a little bit selfish. I actually thought to myself, ‘I wonder if this is selfish?’

We spent the morning at the ‘not so secret’ Secret Beach and with the help of the full face snorkel mask, I spent a really long time exploring all that there was to see underwater.

At first I didn’t see anything except cloudy water and murky rocks, but as my eyes adjusted, everything came alive. I saw these really cool rainbow fish, a couple of puffer fish (which I haven’t seen before), this creepy slithering white and brown snake like thing, lots of those yellow, black and white fish (Gill from Finding Nemo), this really long silvery fish that had a long bill and just kind of hovered above the sand, and so many other spotted, striped, yellow, blue, silver, and white fish. And then I got kind of startled because there was this big something swimming in front of me. You guessed it, a SEA TURTLE!

So at this point, after we discovered Secret Beach last year, we have visited many times and I’ve seen sea turtles almost every time we’ve come here. It is a regular occurrence now to see the shimmering dark circles from the shore, see the cute little heads break the surface for air, and to wade through the shallows with all of the other fascinated beachgoers as we marvel at the sea turtle sightings and the fact that ‘We ARE SWIMMING WITH SEA TURTLES!!!’

And as amazing as these experiences have been, it definitely takes a lot of effort to get photos or video of these sea turtles without someone’s legs in the shot. It gets a little crowded.

So today, as I was admiring all of the fish, and giving my ‘non-swimming’ self a little pat on the back for snorkeling pretty comfortably, I saw this sea turtle swimming in front of me.

And. I. Told. No. One.

I just watched this sea turtle as it swam around, snacking on the algae on the rocks, swimming up to the surface for a breath, and then diving back down. It was amazing. I would pop my head up and see if there was anyone else around, and there really wasn’t anyone that close. I told myself, that I would really have to do a lot to draw anyone’s attention to the fact that there was a sea turtle with me. And so, I just enjoyed this experience to myself. And at one point I had TWO sea turtles swimming with me.

I’ve been waiting to come across sea turtles resting on the beach, and I thought that was the sea turtle experience that has been alluding me. But I didn’t even realize that the most special experience is to be able to observe a sea turtle in its natural habitat, to watch and wait, and be patient, and not feel like you’re chasing it with half a dozen other people.

Today was such an unexpected special experience.

So was I selfish to keep this experience all to myself? Maybe. But I don’t care.

I did tell someone that there was a sea turtle in the water…..eventually.