Sea turtle populations around the world are declining due to the devastating influences that humans are having on their environment. Turtles are threatened by poaching, climate change, coastal development, the fishing industry and marine pollution. Though they have been in our oceans for around 110 million years, their existence is now threatened.

The Royal Thai Navy Sea Turtle Conservation Centre here in Phang Nga has been working for over 30 years to try to increase populations of sea turtles around Thailand. It is estimated that only around 1 in 1000 turtle hatchlings will make it to become breeding adults, in part because turtle hatchlings suffer extremely high rates of predation. The centre is home to a head-start program, which means that turtle hatchlings are reared there until they are between 6 and 9 months old. They are then released back into the ocean with a much smaller risk of being eaten!

The centre relies heavily on the income from tourists, but as the entrance fee is only 60baht (about £1.50) this really only covers the day to day running of the centre. Necessary repairs and improvements often get overlooked because there simply aren’t enough funds to cover them.

In order to help support the work being done at the head-start centre and to help implement some improvements, the staff and volunteers of GVI Phang Nga will taking part in an action packed obstacle course and challenge day! The event will take place on Friday 17^th August, when we will be splitting into teams competing against each other for the coveted title of turtle champion.

We will be completing the course that the Royal Thai Navy use for training purposes, which features a series of challenging obstacles, many of which involve going over water using ropes…there’s a reasonable chance that we’re going to get wet! Once the
official obstacle course is completed there will be further challenges to
complete- teams will have nest like a sea turtle, complete a rope maze whilst blindfolded, and collect a list of random items on a scavenger hunt amongst other things!

It promises to be a fun, challenging and team building kind of day, all in the spirit of raising money for our gorgeous turtles! If you are able to show your support with a donation, no matter how big or small, we (and the turtles) would be extremely grateful!

Thank you and wish us luck!

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