Here is Travis climbing up to the lookout.
View of some of the wetlands.
My talented hubby took the next three pics.
Demi was a bit ahead having fun with Mum Mum and Poppy. The rest of us went into to learn about the terrapins.
Here is Travis observing and learning about terrapins.
Below is the moment things took a turn for the worst! Sometimes I wish my son didn't always NEED to read and learn about EVERYTHING! I know it is a gift he has but it is sometimes a curse. He is only 9 and has a very big heart.
At the moment I snapped this picture I realized something was very wrong with our son!
A second after that picture snapped he turned around with tears in his eyes and was having a hard time speaking. He was so shook up over this! The wall gives lots of info on how they are now endangered animals and how many are killed by being run over by cars. He just kept chanting to me "This shouldn't happen Mom it just shouldn't happen". I wanted to take his hurt away and make things all better but I didn't know how to fix the problem with the endangered turtles. I could see my son was seconds away from falling apart so bad that he wouldn't be able to get himself back together to enjoy the rest of the day (he was ready to fall apart emotionally in the same way I did when I would have a fight with a boyfriend when I was a teenager). I noticed a terrapin donation bank on the end of a counter with his mouth open for the donations and I quickly offered Travis money to help the save the turtles.
I only had about $4.00 in change and I was already counting up dollar bills trying to measure the amount of money that it would take to make my son feel better when my hubby noticed something was wrong. Travis explained to Rob about how the endangered terrapins can become extinct because of cars killing them. Then Rob didn't know what to do. I noticed we all had tear filled eyes very sad for the turtles and for our son. My brilliant hubby picked up his head, raised a finger in the air, and gave a wink (his sign for I have a solution). He ran off and came back with a paper on adopting a terrapin. He asked me if it was OK. I of course was thrilled to know he might be able to save the day. Rob hugged Travis and gave him the paper. He asked Travis if it was something he might want to do (of course Travis was thrilled to be able to help a turtle). Rob and Travis walked off to the main building and left me with Zee (who was sleeping in a stroller). They returned both with big smiles and very happy to go back in the turtle building to read a bit more about them. Rob said that when the turtle was big enough they would let Travis know so he can come to release it into the wild. I am not sure if we will be able to make the trip back out to Cape May but I think that is nice that people can go up to see the turtles they adopt be set free.
I have so many pics on this post I will need to wait until tomorrow to finish up our visit at the wetlands institute.
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