Depoimento de Yasmin sobre dia 16/01/11

16/01/2011                                        Today at Karumbé

Today started for me at 6a.m. I woke up to find everyone still asleep so I snuck back off to bed to get an extra few minutes sleep! It wasn’t long before everyone started to wake up so I dragged myself out of bed. At breakfast, Gabi, Leo, Maru and Renata were trying so hard to get me to drink mate that I tried it again (for the fourth time!) to show them that I really didn’t like it, and surprise surprise I still didn’t like it.

We headed off to Cerro Verde to capture and monitor the turtles in the area. Gabi and Leo helped Gus, Mauro and Bruno put the net in the water and Gabi was excited as it was her first time out in the water. I still haven’t been out as the water has been too rough the times I have tried. Maybe tomorrow!

After a few minutes we captured our first turtle and brought it to shore. It weighed 11kg’s. Gabi stayed out in the water with the others and soon they spotted a chucho (sting ray), Gabi stayed away as the others tried to free it from the net, then another chucho got caught and we had to bring in the net.

We brought the net to the shore and found a hammerhead shark, (an endangered species which we released straight away) a shark that measured 1.5 metres and 3 chuchos! The big shark was very tangled in the net and it took a while to release it from the net. All the animals were set free. Gus decided not to put the net back in the water so our grand total today for turtles captured was……..1. A bit of a difference from the 29 that were caught on Friday! We then measured and weighed the 1 captured turtle and tagged it before releasing it.

We arrived back at Karumbe and some new volunteers had arrived. Sophie and James a couple from Sweden and England (yippie more English speakers! Great for me but not so great for me learning Spanish.)

Then the storm came! A huge summer lightning storm with very strong winds and loadssss of rain! We all sat inside eating dinner and the electricity went out. We spent the rest of dinner in darkness and then the water stopped! We couldn’t wash our dishes or take a shower, we couldn’t even flush the toilet! (This was an especially big problem for new boy James as tomorrow it’s his turn to clean the bathroom. Welcome to Karumbe!