Turtles Galore!

My husband has been going on and on about the turtles he sometimes sees in a little pond at the edge of the local gameland. There is a larger frog pond nearby, where a local biologist has been doing frog research. The guy probably has a Ph.D. in Frogology; that's so cool, but who even knew that was a thing?

So on this afternoon, my husband insisted we take our bikes and head up to the gameland so he could show me the turtles. He warned me in advance that we'd have to be very cautious and quiet, as the turtles are quite easily disturbed, and then they jump off their perches.

The Frogology dude had told him that turtles have very good eyesight, but I'm not sure whether to believe that. Then again, have you ever seen a turtle wearing glasses? No? Me neither! So perhaps it's true after all.

So we took our bikes, and pumping up the hill, I managed to ride the whole way. We dismounted in the muddy parking lot and crept along a little trail by the woods. SUCCESS! THERE THEY WERE! From our first stop, I could see about four turtles. There they sat on the logs, undisturbed.

But I somehow sensed there was more to see. And so I crept, silently, a bit further out the trail. We whispered to one another in golf-announcer voices, kept our movements and gestures to a minimum. And then we were rewarded by this sight: the pond was simply LOADED with turtles! I counted eight, but it's possible there were more.

We laughed quietly, and I snapped a few more shots; then we walked back to our bikes. I thought about walking around the top of the pond, but I knew that would set them jumping. For some reason, I didn't want to disturb them; the turtles seemed so happy and mellow there on their tiny pond.

In the parking lot, we resumed our regular voices. We cackled excitedly. We had been lucky: it was the largest gathering of turtles he'd ever seen there, and none of them had jumped before we got to see them. Hooray!

And then my husband turned to me, and said, "You wanted me to show you the turtles and so I did."  So: mission accomplished! And then he added: "I know sometimes you want a song for your picture, so here's one." And he began to serenade me with this tune:

You showed me how to do
Exactly what you do
How I fell in love with you
Oh, oh, oh, it's true
Oh, oh, I love you

I think he nailed that one, folks. So here is our song for the day: the Turtles, with You Showed Me. And just for fun, I'm tossing in a second turtle song that I think fits quite well too: the Turtles, with Happy Together.  

:-)   :-)   :-)   :-)   :-)   :-)   :-)   :-)  <---eight smiles, one for each turtle!