Watching Turtles...

For a few months now Ritchie, our Coffee Plantation neighbor and biggest fan of our decaf soy latte, has been telling us his incredible stories of Turtle rescues and Turtle rehabilitation's at his Marathon Turtle Hospital.
Ritchie also invited us to visit his Turtle Hospital and we found an fantastic organization.
The Turtle Hospital Ritchie started, is a non for profit organization that operates and stays afloat from donations and "Turtle Hospitals Tours" given by the well informed staff of the Hospital.
This week the Turtles risk of being hit by boat traffic increased due to the World Championship Power Boat races, a annual event that brings a lot of power boat enthusiastics to our island of Key West. A phenomenal event with a wide variety of incredible powerboats.
For the safety of our local sea life the powerboat officials call in the sea life expertise of Ritchie to ensure that no harm is done to our Turtles, Manatee's, Dolphin's and other creatures that call our ocean waters home.
For this job a helicopter is needed to spot the active sea life, and findings are reported to the race officials who either delay the start of the race, or even stop the race until the track is clear.
Diane and I were invited to be the "Spotters" on board the helicopter...
This is one of the coolest things we have ever done...
We even rescued a injured turtle before the race started...
Thank you, Gee, our helicopter pilot, Bette, from the Dolphin research center and our Ritchie...
Just imagine... hoovering for three hours above at least twenty power boats during their race while looking out for turtles and other sea life.
Wow... what a ride... thanks Ritchie, from now on November 5th is Ritchie day at the Coffee Plantation.