Last night was tons of fun!
The night started out rather late with Georgia arriving at 1AM. Shana called and said this turtle is HUGE, and I replied "yep that's Georgia". She is our biggest nesting turtle and stretches our tape measures at around 168cm! After a well deserved break from wind and salt, we headed back out and I found Maya quietly covering her nest on the north end of Juno Beach. I checked her out, continued north and encountered another turtle quickly heading towards the water! This one was Meissa a turtle tagged during the 2002 nesting season. We were unable to fully tag and measure her that year, so it was quite lucky that the single tag we applied to her was still attached. Meissa looked GIANT and I was really suprised to find that she was only 152cm or so. I thought it was the biggest turtle I have ever seen and it was funny to discover that Niki and Kelly described this turtle as "grouchy and as big as a bus" when they encountered her in 2002. We have not have time yet to fully examine her - she always seems to be finishing up her nest when we arrive. I hope that we see her again to figure out why she looks soo big....
The night did not end there however - one more turtle! Another turtle Zhang was found on the south end of the beach. Zhang was also tagged during the 2002 season and it was good to see her again. Shana described her as "perfect" with not a scratch on her. It is good to see that not all leatherbacks are scratched up and scarred.

I Guess the turtles are here now!