The highlight of the final day at sea between St Helena & Ascension Island were not the Seabirds including the first Ascension Island Frigatebird or the Cetaceans & other Sealife seen, but some messy eaters were saw as we passed them. They were four Leatherback Turtles, the first Leatherback Turtles we saw on the Odyssey.
Leatherback Turtle: The large size & lack of any plates on the body leaves Leatherback Turtle as the only candidate. They have five long ridges on their back
Leatherback Turtle: It was on view for the best part of a minute, before it finally dived
I had mixed emotions when I initially saw this first Leatherback Turtle. While it was good to have only seen my second Leatherback Turtle (the first being on the Pompey - Bilboa ferry in Aug 1999 of the French coast), I thought it was tangled in some pink debris hence my mixed feelings. I had been mainly looking through the camera & unable to fully see what the pink debris was. After we were discussing the Leatherback Turtle, somebody pointed out that what we had actually seen was a Leatherback Turtle feeding on one of its favourite foods: Salp. Salp is a long barrel-like floating planktonic 'Jellyfish', however, it strictly not a Jellyfish. Salp feed on phytoplankton. Within 45 minutes, we had seen our second Leatherback Turtle of the day.
Leatherback Turtle: The second sighting started in a similar way to the first
It had been a great morning.