turtle conservatory

this was one of my bucket list items!  I've always wanted to see sea turtles and we got far more than that experience here!  all over bali- fishermen find turtle egg stashes and bring them to the turtle education and conservatory to keep them safe and let them hatch there. It's located out on a mini island off bali.  You can get there via a small bridge .  It's a small center operated entirely by volunteers and is nothing fancy! but we loved it.

it's not touristy and is run by locals.  It's completely free but you can make donations to adopt a turtle.

if you haven't held a baby sea turtle- you haven't lived!!

mack thought they were SO funny.

we got to watch several hatch and this guy was still attached to the placenta!!

this is the hatching sand pit!

They stay until they are a little bigger and then are released into the wild!

we adopted a little guy and named him (or course) crush.  Isn't that what all sea turtles are named??

then we tool a walk out to the water so we could let him go.

good luck crush!!

I could have taken pictures of sea turtles all day.  I really wish I'd had my other lens with me!!!

metta was enamoured by their cuteness. as was I, obviously.

and i had to include this picture because their money is INSANE!  we constantly had millions of rupiah on us!! SO MANY BILLS!!