Christies

Christie Whelan visiting the field boat the year we satellite-tagged Christie the turtle.

“My dream is to be in Trinidad and to see Christie the turtle nesting,” Christie Whelan said to me a few weeks ago, hoping to join our Field Trip to Trinidad next month. This Wednesday, however, she called, disappointed, to say she couldn’t make it.

And as though she’d heard their meeting was off, Christie the sea turtle hauled up on the beach at Grand Rivière a few days later.

Christie Whelan was just finishing her graduate work in sea turtle biology at Florida Atlantic University when I met her coming off an elevator at the International Sea Turtle Symposium more than 15 years ago.

She ran over to me, introduced herself with characteristic exuberance, and said, “I’m from Canada, too!”

Since practically that moment, crystalline in my memory, Christie Whelan has been one of the greatest sources of moral—and sometimes extremely practical—support of our sea turtle work, even though she lives far away. So I was particularly happy when Mike called me early in the morning Sunday and announced, “Christie is back!”

He was talking about the sea turtle, which we first satellite tagged off southwest Nova Scotia in August 2014. When we caught her, she had flipper tags from Trinidad that had been applied seven years earlier.

Christie when Kyle satellite tagged her on Matura Beach in 2015.

We tracked Christie back down to waters off Trinidad—and just before she nested, her transmitter stopped sending signals. (Sound familiar, RIHANNA?!) However, Kyle from NatureSeekers luckily came across her while patrolling Matura Beach that year. He put another satellite tag on her and we watched, fascinated, as she made her return trip to Canadian waters.

Christie’s track from the nesting beach back up to Canada in 2015.

Christie has lived large in our minds over the years. We’d hear about her turning up at different beaches in Trinidad—Fishing Pond, Matura, Grand Rivière—making the rounds, never entirely predictable, a little adventurous. And this weekend, she got a brand-new satellite transmitter, so we will get a rare chance to follow the details of her journey back north a second time.

One of the things I love about Christie Whelan is that she doesn’t temper her joy about sea turtle things. She goes all in, every time. “This is AMAZING!” she exclaimed when Mike called to update her.

And the force of her delight reminds you just how amazing it is.