Wednesday, May 11, 2011

The other day on the way back home...

10 Months have passed. Jalova has been the best thing that happened to me so far. But it was not until today that I saw a jag. It was so exciting that I could barely understand what was going on.

I remember driving the boat from a nice day in Tortuguero with the volunteers and on the way back, daydreaming, after a turn I saw something odd in the vegetation on top of a log. At first I couldn't see exactly what it was because it was too far away, but I kept looking at the same place as if something would materialize in that exact spot. Well, as we got closer and closer, this fuzzy blob shape turned out to be what I imagined it would be a jag.

As soon as I saw it I cut off the throttle and the boat slowed down, and I said "guys there's a jag over there! Get your cameras out, quick!" Everybody silently started snapping away. For a moment all was silent and all we could hear was the snapping sound of the shutters. I manoeuvred the boat to get closer to him, for a few seconds that seem to last for hours, he didn't move at all, just looked at us very calmly. As we got closer he felt that it was time to go. He got up, turned, looked back one more time and disappeared into the vegetation. Everybody went. WOOOOWwwwww!!! WE SAW A JAG!!!!



There were 14 of us in total on the boat. 10 volunteers and 4 staff. Somebody said, "my God, we saw it all"! It was really exciting. I was so excited that the image of the approaching moments was playing itself inside my head over and over again. Even today I have a big smile on my face as I remember this events.
It was special.

Later we found out that the jag that we saw was none other than "Alex", brother of "Luca" that we captured on the jaguar camera project last year, both feeding on a green turtle! (photo: Tina, gallerytinaphotography)

João Gouveia


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