I am waiting for information from Puerto Rico about the hurricane damage and their turtle rehabilitation there, but as they are still without power and communications, I am sorry to let you know that we will have to delay this story. HOWEVER due to our turtle LOVE fundraising and sales of our Turtle Love styles to date we have saved 1,800 hatchlings !!! I am so excited, and so is this little guy!
You know I am sharing my stories with you guys each week, but the bonus in this for ME, is that some of you share your stories back with me. This week, I have had some lovely emails from other islands friends, telling me about their area's post hurricane situations. The first is from Betsy, who is feeling exhausted after cleaning up from 4 floods in 30 days. A smelly silt later coated her entire downstairs after the lake waters receded, however she is just grateful that she was still able to recover upstairs with all the comforts of home.
Betsy wrote the following : I got the Aqua Turtle Tunic for my hostess who gave me refuge while I evacuated to Ft Lauderdale twice from New Orleans. We were all enjoying the wonders of the great turtles laying thousands upon thousands of eggs on our beach club property. I was so saddened to hear that Irma's surge wiped out all the nests along with an entire new generation of the species. All the more reason that my friend loved the tunic with little heart turtles on, which we shall both remember in tribute to all those little ones lost in the storm.
The turtle nests are at Lago Mar Resort in Ft Lauderdale, just north of the Port Everglades inlet, and all along the city beachfront where street lights and even hotel room lights are not permitted to shine towards the beachside, because they confuse hatchlings and attract them inland instead of out to the moonshine on the surf!
Many locals conservationists mark the nests as soon as mom heads back out to sea using yellow tape and visit nightly to observe the wonders of nature as each nest full of eggs begin to crack, and hatchling emerge, already equipped with all the instincts they need to begin their journey out to sea for thousands of miles , before they return to the same beach where they were born to build their own nest, lay their eggs, and continue the magnificent circle of life.
It is heartbreaking to hear of the loss of so many this year during the storm surges.. Turtle lovers now wonder if, in the future, there will come a year when no turtles come as a result of the loss of so many offspring during the hurricanes of in 2017. 🐢🐢🐢🐢🐢
I'm so pleased your caring story telling extends to all creatures, large and small.
Thanks for the lovely story Betsy.
Now over to Tricia : Our hotel in Naples has yet to reopen. We hope for partial reopening Nov 17th. When we get back on our feet, and, I can once again think about selling in our boutique, I’ll be in touch to order some sarongs. Just think, we’re in one of the wealthiest cities in the USA and people are still struggling from Irma. The debris everywhere in town is slowly, very slowly, being picked up by Fema. Walk in our shoes and the shoes of our line staff (managers are working thankfully) that haven’t worked since Sept 9. I feel your pain and that of your fellow islanders. And, I will consider visiting an island as soon as I can get away. After “season”.
Incredible to think a city like Naples is still cleaning up, but we know it will be back to its stunning best soon!
I had an amazing email from a big corporate company earlier in October. We do our accounting books with the XERO software. This is the email I got from them.... WOW some of the big corporates really do care. I am impressed.
We know it must be tough right now for you living and working in one of the areas most affected by Hurricane Irma. We really hope that you and your family are keeping safe and well.
We understand that the next few months could be challenging for your business and we want to be of assistance where we can. So if your business has been directly affected, please let us know. We’d like to offer a couple of months respite from your Xero subscription payments.
Simply reply to this email if you’ve been impacted and we’ll get back to you.
Wow - that is very nice of them.
This is an email I got from Denise who was on vacation in the BVI when Irma struck.
My husband and I were on vacation in Virgin Gorda, BVIs when Irma decided to visit. We were unable to secure a flight out of San Juan on any airline to anyplace for several days prior to the storm - Puerto Ricans were leaving the island in mass. We live in Boca Raton and have been thru several hurricanes and knew what Cat 5 hurricane damage could look like having volunteered in South Dade County after Andrew. We hunkered down in a very secure building on the south end of the island near the Baths. With the exception of a few solar panels ripped from the roof and some gutter damage, the building was intact. However as we soon saw and the world now knows, the damage is massive and devastating. The Guavaberry Spring Bay cottage we had stayed for 10 days prior to the storm was reduced to just some interior walls. We became workers, and five days after the storm we were evacuated via helicopter to San Juan and returned to our home in Florida, which was without power but thankfully undamaged from Irma.
I know that your clothing is sold at Dive BVI on Virgin Gorda as friends had gone to the marina store the week before and bought some tops between their time on the beach. I am not a social media person, but I have been following Facebooks for Dive BVI and the public page for Virgin Gorda......you may want to check them out for updates.
I know your heart is breaking, just as ours, for these massive disasters to have hit the Caribbean & Florida. We look forward to returning when they are ready to accept visitors again.
There are SO many islands, and places in Florida that were NOT at all impacted by the hurricanes, so a winter vacation in paradise is still very much possible. Also even the places that were damaged have been working very hard to get back up and running ASAP. So whether you want sunshine, and paradise, or you want to see damage, or you want to go down south to HELP,
click here for a fantastic website with lovely regular updates on all of our favorite islands.
Thanks so much for sharing your stories with us island friends x
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Thanks Kim for posing the turtle stories with the great pics of Lago Mar! Great idea to extend the sale too! Will grab another as a Christmas gift, and will enjoy sharing the cheer-y sarongs TOO!!!