Our last day.

This morning we headed out to this mans house. His name is Pepe.

He has built his house by himself, and he lives off of the resource's of the land. He has a chicken to provide him eggs and a donkey to help plow the fields. Pepe is in his late sixties and is a very macho man. He wasnt huge but his body was practically pure muscle and he made the job look easy! He had us help build a roof to put over his work area. We made a ton of cement and used it to help hold up tree trunks as posts.

All of the food we had in our house that we were not going to be able to eat we packed up and gave to Pepe. He was so thankful. Pepe had a very humble and kind face. He was patient with us and very kind. Wes and I have his contact information and when we come back to Cozumel next summer we will see if he needs more help.

After we helped Pepe we hung out in the pool for awhile and then headed into town to walk around the plaza with some puppies and kittens to see if we could get them adopted. We had a bunch of people say they were going to go to the shelter soon so i hope they really will.

Now we are packing and getting ready for bed for our safe flight home. See you soon Dallas.

Peace.

JB

All around as I type this, the youth group is running around the house collecting scattered belongings and packing gifts from the island. We head home tomorrow bright and early, and my what a week.

Day 1
We ate at a spectacular restaurant and helped the local economy.

Day 2
We spent time getting to know the island.We played with a dolphin named Eva (this was her name before Wall-E).

Day 3
We spent Wednesday giving all of our love to animals at the humane society.

Day 4
This was the night that the turtle people found 100 nests. That day we went to the Spanish English Academy and secured Texas Independence by winning at jeopardy.

Day 5
Another day at the humane society, and yours truly went out to save the baby turtles

Day6
Our day off to appreciate the island. There is so much of it to wonder at

Day 7
We helped a man named Pepe...see Jennys blog to really understand.

Mike was kind enough to provide me with some numbers from our trip.
1,200 Baby turtles made it to the water with our help

We found 265 nests were marked...thats about 31,700 eggs

We have done well

Yours Truly
JP

Sorry its been a while since I've bloged. I didn't have a whole lot of time to write.

So I'll start with Friday morning. We helped out at the humane society again and I said goodbye to the three kittens I fell in love with. :( I hope the get adopted. Well we just did the same stuff as last time, painted a bunch of shades and shelves. Then we hung out around the house a bit with some down time. And then went into town for a little shopping. It was a chill day and I was so happy for that because it was my night for turtles.

Alright so when Lisa, Julia, Zander, and I showed up at Panteras house we waited another 30 minutes untill some else came to pick us up. Then we drove around for a long time and finally to go the beach. Then we kind of had a group meeting talking about whats going to happen and then it started to rain on us for awhile. Julia and I measured and marked where the eggs were and how far the are from the street. We measured and marked about 40 nests. It was a slower night compared to the others but still very important.

Around 3 AM we found a nest of hatching turtles. They were the cutest things every!! They were so so so tiny. I  helped walk them down to the beach and save them from crabs. I stepped on a few and hit one with a stick hahaha.

Well besides the turtles I saw a yellowish-orange half moon just sitting on the ocean. It looked unreal, like it was painted on the sky. And the stars, they were so gorgeous. We all so so many shooting stars. It was unbelievable.

By 6 AM we were driving home and I slept untill 2PM hahaha I was so tired. A group of people helped clean up the beach this morning and repair this mans roof.

So I promise to write sooner tomorrow and let you know when we get back into Dallas monday.

Peace!

JB

I know I said that last nights turtle adventures would have been documented at 6a.m. But if you talk to the other people in my group, they would have told you I was making up words and not making sense.....my appologies

But now, awake and speaking in acctual sentances, last nights adventure.

It was a slow start compared to the other groups. We didn't get to our first nest untill 11 where we found a six foot turtle digging her nest. For the next few hours Jenny and I ran up and down the beach marking the nests from the road. The moon came up and gave us light and the waves kept a constant beat that kept us alert.

But the real magic came when we found our first nest. As we aproached the hole we couldn't see anything. Then as we looked down, we got our first glimps of the little animals, smaller than our palm. The thought that this little squirming thing in my hand would grow up to be six feet long.

We also had the honor to save  turtles that might not have made it. Aside from kicking and crabs that came their way, some of the turtles needed some extra help. They still had ambilical cords attached and had some difficulty getting through the sand. We cleared their paths and watched over them for an hour till they found their way to the ocean.

We have just returned from a day of playing at the beach and a night of dancing. We will be home on monday...I will be sad to go but I do miss everyone back home.

Yours Truly
JP

We have returned quite tan, tired, and covered in paint, from the Humane Society shelter. We had finished up the last bit of painting and said our goodbyes to the dogs and cats.

I didn't get a chance to say yesterday, but if anyone ever gets the chance to worship on the beach, DO IT! After half a day of work picking up trash and getting another member from the airport, we all went down to the east side of the island and went down to the water.

I'd like you to imagine singing "Joyful Joyful we adore thee..." to the sound of the waves smashing into the beach... It's not something you forget.

Tonight myself, Jenny (the other main bloger), and Zander will be going out to turtle.....so tune in at a reasonable hour tomorrow because we will have  everything up by 6a.m.

yours truly 
JP

In the beginning of this adventure Erin and I were a bit disappointed. The rest of our group was playing jeorpardy with the advanced Spanish - English class of the Spanish English Academy. Our early departure for turtles meant that we missed the entire game. Apparently Texas was victorious (wooot). Mike probably won't admit it but we got lost three times on the way to Pentera's. Even though he had been there tw days ago hehehehehe. Once we arrived we were off to save baby sea turtles, or so we thought. Upon arrival we were delayed unil around 11:30 due to tourists looking at the journey to the sea. I have nothing against educating the people but I was jonesing to work! By the time we began our adenture I was loosing it fast.

First we saw a nest (nerdo) explode with turtles and aided them across rocks and feet to the water. In total we say seven grande tourgtuas lay eggs and go back to the sea. Two sets of infant turtles journey to the sea. Some cows tried to cross our path on the road, none were harmed. On the way home at seven a.m. a flock of vultures swarmed a nest. Slamming the breaks we stopped and shooed them away. Only to discover that some of tem had been breakfast. A set of twin turtles was found in an egg. That was cool.

The stars at night were brilliant as well as the moon. It jus felt like God was sitting right there with you on the beach. The sun rose above cotton candy colored clouds and an amazingly blue ocean. The jungle stood out to an extreme against the blue blue sky. Now Mike and Erin are passed out in their respecive places. It's nine in the morning and I have yet to close my eyes into slumber.

Rachel says I should also talk about the days events since I'm awake. The first thing is first. Lillibet arrived safely. We all met up at the Mayan ruins. The large group accidentaly missed almost all the ruin by staying on the modern path. Rachel and I took the alernative gassy route and saw all details. There were not the most amazing ruins but they still held their own.

Each day just keeps getting better.

This morning we cleaned up along the shore line and had probably 15 bags filled with trash. It was a tedious job but we made it interesting. We also learned that picking up all this trash is really saving our sea turtles that we are helping every night too. Some of the trash like six pack rings or any type of string can really harm them. The six pack rings can end up around the sea turtles neck and as they grow it tightens and they eventually suffocate and die. The string will look like jellyfish in the sea and that's what sea turtles eat and it will wrap around their intestines and will also eventually kill them. So picking up all the trash that we did probably saved a lot of sea turtle lives.

After picking up trash all morning we took a break and went for a swim in the ocean and then went to Sherry's house and took a tour of her Butterfly Sanctuary. It was beautiful, but not many butterflies were out today.

When it was almost 1 PM we drove to the airport to pick up lillibet. We were all very glad to have her join us. Then we headed off to the Mayan Ruins!!!

 It was fun to walk around the Ruins but it got really hot and we kind of got lost for awhile wondering around a bunch of paths. We saw some cool buildings and lots of iguanas. Which also means I have to clear something up. Emma kept saying that Iguanas have a third eye on top of their head. She was completely serious!!! So if anyone else agrees with her please tell me because none of us think they do.

Alright so after the Mayan ruins we headed out to do some devotions on the beach which was absolutly gorgeous. We sang our hearts out to the ocean and the sky above, it was spectacular and a heart warming moment. Next we went to help at the Spanish-English Academy. We met some really nice people there and we had a contest with them using Spanish and English. It was really fun!

Tonight it is Mike, Erin, and Kate out to help the turtles. Tomorrow is my turn and I cant wait! Everyone has been seeing baby turtles hatch and I really hope some do when I am there. I feel like we are really making an impact to help save these turtles.

It was a very busy but worthwhile day and tomorrow we head back out to the shelter to finish painting some boards and then we might have some down time to hang around town and snorkel.

Peace. Save the Earth, and give Thanks.

JB

Today we went to the humane society to help build and paint some boards to put up before the hurricane. Before we could get started though we played with the cutest puppies and kittens!! They were so sweet! We also walked a bunch of dogs too.

Well we painted about 16 or more boards front, back, and all the sides. We painted all those twice, once with a sealer then with the actual paint. We had to trade off people every 10 minutes or so because it was so hot. But it was worth it because we really wanted to help protect the shelter from the hurricane.

That took up our whole day from 10 AM to 5 PM but it was worth it for the in between time of falling in love with the puppies and kittens. I'm more of a cat person and completely fell in love with two twin kittens that I really wanted to take home. And I couldn't help but fall in love with a puppy we named bear. She was so sweet and had the cutests markings.

 After our long day of hard work we made some amazing dinner of spaghetti, salad, fruit, guacamole, and for dessert rice cream. Yummy!

Right now Lisa, Sarah, and Wes are out helping the turtles. They were all really excited and were hoping to see some baby turtles like last nights group did.

Okay so tomorrow we are cleaning up some beaches, helping out with the Spanish-English school, viewing the ruins and share some devotions, and see a butterfly sanctuary. Sounds busy but im really excited it all sounds amazing!!

 Stay tuned for my blog on what happens tomorrow!

JB

All in one night we saw, a momma laying eggs, a few turtles digging thier holes, a comical turtle, and two sets of babies.

 While we were driving along the beach, we caught sight of a turtle in a hole. As we got closer, we noticed that she was laying her eggs. It was incredible to see. She did not seem bothered by our on-looking so we watched for a while. The eggs were a white-creamy color and looked very slick. It was a great start to our night. The next turtle we saw was walking to the beach and she was a grande tortuga! She was extremely large and we just caught her in time to measure her. We couldn't understand the measurements, but let's just say she was granissimo.

Then we got to dig up the eggs. We dug them up to make sure that they were healthy and not too close to the huge waves. Pantera, our guide, was super-digger and could get the job done very fast. After he dug up a few holes, he said that it was Mike's turn. Mike wasn't a bad digger himself, and got to the eggs quickly. Pantera wanted Mike to get one out, so he carefully lifted it out. It was very cool. As we were walking back to the truck, Pantera said that it was my turn next. The eggs that he told me to dig up were extremely deep. It was about the length of my arm. I had to get on my stomach to reach that far. Finally, I reached the eggs and got to hold one! It was amazing to think that a little turtle will hatch out of that egg and then grow into a gigantic animal.

The next turtle we encountered was a comical one. While we were trying to dig up her eggs that she just laid, she decided that she was 'throw' sand at us at the same time. It was like having a sand bath at the wrong time since we wanted sand out of our holes and not in them. We finally found her eggs and we about to leave when she decided that she would head back to the water as well. We were sure she did that on purpose.

The next thing we got to do was my favorite part. While we were helping the other group with their job, someone spotted babies that just hatched and were trying to get back to the water. We made it so it was easy for them to get out of the hole then we had to protect them. It was Mike's job to scare the crabs away and boy did he scare them. He would chase after them with a stick screaming at them. It was quite a sight. The turtles were so little and helpless but they had so much determination to make it out to the water, it was incredible. It was fun to watch them get swept away by the waves and then become such a small creature in the vast ocean. Pantera said that they would come back to that exact spot to lay their own eggs.

That night was extremely fun and I highly doubt that the three of us will ever forget. We learned alot about the sea turtles, increased our Spanish vocabulary, and learned not to drink Red Bull.

ET

We are taking our first break from helping with the animal shelter. Needless to say, each of us has already fallen in love with one animal or another! Dogs, cats, and their babies captured our hearts as we walked and played with them.

Not many people are really aware of the need for adoption in Cozumel. Some of the animals have been at the shelter for over three years. The Humane Society (shelter where we were) spades and neuters the animals in the community for free. This does help with population but animals still need homes...So if you are looking to adopt an animal PLEASE make these island animals an option.

Our first person has just woken up from their turtle expedition (they got back to the house at 6 a.m.) so he will be bloging shortly about it! 

Keep us in your prayers

Yours Truely
JP