So I am living here for the summer, working with the University of Florida. Interning really. So far my job consists of riding an ATV on the beach for 5 hours a night, under beautifully clear skies looking for turtle crawls. The season has been slow so far, I have spent most nights sitting in the back of the old blue S10, or laying across the quad staring at the stars and getting to know the milky-way. The bugs can get bad, they bother me most when I get one in the eye as I’m driving down the beach. Even still they do not disrupt the beauty of Cape San Blas.

While riding I need to keep a keen eye to look for a turtle crawl, the mark the turtles leave as they lurch up the beach in search of the perfect spot to drop their eggs. This is when we spring into action, and watch the turtle as it slowly crawls to its spot, and starts to dig. When it starts to drop eggs 15 minutes later I will sneak up behind it, measure the carapace and tag it with one metal tag in each flipper and a sub-dermal RFID PIT tag. I mark the nest with GPS, and measure how wide the crawl is. This is of course what I do if they turtle actually nests, sometimes they walk around for a bit, decide its not the right place or right time and head back into the water.

Basically what I’m saying is the work is awesome, I love it. I also like the majority of the people that I am working with. Really I only dislike one technician. Nearly every night, around 6:30 or 7 a group of us will get the grill going, throw on some food and hang out until work time. Eating food, listening to music, throwing some sort of ball around. Some days include a trip to the water, which is literally in my back yard. The water here can best be described as piss warm. It is still refreshing, much different than New England water. I like it when my legs dont hurt after being in the water for 5 minutes.

The sun shines every day, the pelicans fly by, the dolphins and sharks swim in the distance. This is so much better than I thought Florida would be. So why am I letting pointless things bother me? Do I want to work with sea turtles for the rest of my life? Probably not, they cool but ultimately big and dumb. Can I still do my job and put up with hearing 3 different things from all of my bosses? Most definitely. Just an off day I guess.

I shall soldier through the next month and a half, and decide what I am going to do after that. Do I stay here as long as possible? Do I go back to New England for a bit? There is still time to figure it all out I guess.