Boatswain Turtle Farm

[bamanga]

I booked this excursion for my family on our cruise next week but have now read some bad reviews from trip advisor about the condition of the holding tanks and the condition of the lagoons. It doesn't seem to be kept up well and it has a smell. Has anyone out there in cruise critic land been there recently and give me their opinion??

[m steve]

and enjoyed the place. Saw the turtles, held a few, swam in the lagoon and had lunch. I went to their web site and bought tickets on line and saved about 20%. We were staying on the island.

[nybumpkin]

We had a great time when we went in February. Here's a link to my review with pictures: http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1151709&highlight=conquest

[MomtoCCC]

I am wavering about this also... planning to take 7yo dd. I think she will really like the turtles. I was planning on paying the full price for the swimming pool and lagoon but then heard some of the same things.. (smelly, not clean, etc...)... would really like to hear from someone who did the full package recently.

[m steve]

the clearest water I ever swam in. Lots of floating stuff.

[lovevacadays]

For me, I didn't like the Turtle Farm portion. It made me a little sad and I am a person who knows that we farm many types of creatures for our eating pleasure. I just don't want to go on vacation to a place that does this, especially when you can walk from the farm where the live creatures are into the gift shop where they are selling turtle soup, etc.. I'm not trying to be political at all - that's just not me. I'm an ex FFA member so raised my share of livestock to eat. It just wasn't my cup of tea.

 

However, there are other things to do there. I guess each person has to make their own choices.

[m steve]

people for the ethical treatment of turtles.

[Stevesan]

the clearest water I ever swam in. Lots of floating stuff.

 

Please, not Baby Ruth's!!:eek:

[m steve]

but it's nasty.

[sargenet]

I had been booked next month to take our 7 year old here. I am glad I read the information posted in this thread. It was upsetting to hear that they are mostly for consumption. I especially didn't want to go there and have my 7 year old find out! He would have been so upset by it! He is so funny about things. His dad talked about going "fishing" and he freaked and started talking about fishing nets killing dolphins! I guess he is just at this "age" where he is learning about "saving the animals" etc!

 

So this morning I explained to him that I thought we should reconsider and do something else. He said he would just have to go and tell them NOT to eat the turtles and explain to him that they all needed to go back in the ocean!

 

Ok...so we are doing something different this trip! I don't want to have to deal with a little activist on my hands...and truly I think it would bother me too!!!

[K&DW]

The point of the turtle farm is to protect the population in the ocean. Being an island, turtles are a common protein source in the caribbean as they don't have a lot of pasture land for herding cattle, they need what land they have for herding tourists :D. According to their website 60% of the turtles become local food, 1-2% are kept for breeding, and the rest are released in the wild. Which has been about 30,000 since 1980.

 

I was there maybe 2 or 3 years back and I think I know why there is a misunderstanding of the pools. The place was very clean and well kept. The snorkling pool may not seem that way because it supposed to be a more natural habit for the fish, instead of being ultra filtered like you would see at Sea World or the snorkle tank at Disney's Typhoon Lagoon.

[drew sailbum]

Using publically available numbers from the Turtle Farm and government officials, I recently calculated the current release rate for turtles hatched at the Turtle Farm to be less than 1%. Check the numbers in this thread: http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1255364&page=2&highlight=turtle+released

[njdevil08]

I guess I'm in the minority here. We didn't do the swim...so can't comment on that (maybe that's why people have a very negative view) but the turtle tanks themselves were interesting. It wasn't the CLEANEST place I've been to, but you're on a Caribbean island, we weren't exactly expecting it to be the best quality. We took the kids and they loved the turtles, spent about an hour there before stingray city.