here turtle, turtle!

Of course I couldn’t expect another epic day like yesterday……and well, no dolphins for today!  It was still a gorgeous day, though,  for paddling with just a hint of breeze blowing from the south.  I paddled down to the boat ramp and when I got there, the wind totally backed off.  The ocean got really glassy and nice!  I immediately started to see the turtles……with two popping up right near me.  I cruised over to sit between them, and when I got there, it ended up being three turtles with me in the middle! More turtles surfaced and I was having a hard time keeping track of them.  A paddling friend joined me and a turtle came right up to me and popped its head out of the water to take a big breath of air.  I knew this was coming  (after the same thing happened the other day…) so I was prepared……the turtles mouth opened wide right by me and this time I didn’t flinch!  Then it dove under me and come up on the other side of me.  I yelled to my friend to ask if she saw that, but she was too focused on another turtle by her.  We were both surrounded by four turtles, and then when she paddled on, I was surrounded by four more turtles!  I stayed down at the boat ramp for quite a while since there were so many friendly turtles. Just as I was going to leave, another paddling friend cruised into the area so I stayed longer.  A few more turtles surfaced until I counted twenty-nine for the day!  Then an ambulance drove up by the boat ramp and a boat came zipping in followed by a Coast Guard patrol boat.  My friend and I watched while they loaded someone onto the ambulance!  We didn’t know what happened though.  Paddling back was really nice and at the calm conditions prevailed all the way through my swim too!  What a nice day for Halloween!