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Tour de Turtles Journey from Cuba to Florida
This past Summer, I had the amazing opportunity to travel to Maria La Gorda, Cuba, the far most western tip of Cuba as part of the Sea Turtle Conservancy Sea Turtle Expedition.

While the core part of our trip was to tag sea turtles to be entered in the upcoming Tour de Turtles race, the trip also provided a wonderful introduction to Cuba.

Beginning with a two night stay at the Historic Hotel Nacional and a tour of the five plazas in historic Old Havana, we then left Havana for Maria LaGorda.

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On the way to Maria La Gorda we visited Laz Terrazas, a former coffee plantation worked by slaves, that has been reforested and converted into an ecotourism resort. With the end of slavery, coffee was not as profitable. The new resort has provided jobs, education for the community, and a new pride in the local people. A small portion of the area still grows coffee, which we did sample at Caftan Buenavista.

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On our return to Havana, we were able to spend a night in the town of Vinales, in Pinar del Rio. The area is the heartland of Cuba for tobacco, fruits and vegetables, and their fine rum.

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As we were leaving Havana, David Godfrey, executive director of the Sea Turtle Conservancy summarized our trip of exploring the environment, the culture, the people, and the sea turtles of Cuba, and experiencing recreational tourism in a sustainable way. View David Godfrey sharing his thoughts in video below.

The nights on the beach at Maria La Gorda tagging the sea turtles were magical. The night sky was so dark in this remote part of Cuba that one could see Saturn with the naked eye, something I didn't realize was even possible.

While in Maria La Gorda I had the opportunity to speak with Richie Moretti, Director of the Turtle Hospital in Marathon Key, Florida, which sponsored one of the turtles we tagged in Cuba.

Richie shared some of the many hazards that sea turtles face and some important ideas that humans can implement to help protect them from fishing line, boat strikes and more.

View Richie sharing his thoughts below.

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We were on the beaches for three nights and yet only able to capture, tag, and release turtles on one of them. The night we were successful, we tagged two sea turtles. We worked from 9:00 p.m. until 6:30 a.m. under the knowledgeable and skilled direction of Dan Evans, the Sea Turtle Conservancy technology and research biologist, and Dr. Julio Anza Ricardo, the research scientist in Cuba.

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There are multiple purposes for placing the tracking devices on the sea turtles, including:

learning where they go and where they spend their time
what areas are important to the sea turtles beyond the nesting areas
what foraging and feeding areas they go to
how often they come up to nest
whether they use the same nesting beaches and do they use different beaches at different times of the year

This is important new research as there has been little tracking of sea turtles in Cuba.

Already through the tracking devices we have seen one turtle Esperanza nest in both Cuba and Mexico traveling first to Belize and then hugging the coast line around the Yucatan. This is the first time a sea turtle has been documented as nesting in two different countries in the same season.

The other turtle Juilia in contrast has gone South toward Nicaragua.

This information is critical for knowing where and how to best develop new sustainable tourism areas and make existing tourist areas more sustainable in their practice.

View an overview video of the project in Dan Evan's own words.

Dr. Julio Anza Ricardo is the scientific coordinator for all the conservation going on in Cuba's protected areas.

A key part of her organization's work is to achieve sustainable tourism particularly in all the coastal resort areas of Cuba. This includes both existing tourism resorts and future ones to be developed with an emphasis on protecting sea turtles. Education is a key part in her work with tourism including developing the protocol on how tourists can interact with the turtles in these resort areas.

View Dr. Julio Ricardo's thoughts below.

Also on the expedition was Gary Appleson, the Sea Turtle Policy Coordinator. Gary provided some thoughts on important policy to protect sea turtles, and equally as important, some of the education that is needed for tourists to best protect them.

Some of the key issues that Gary raised included lighting that protects turtles, the need to keep pets off the beaches, particularly in nesting season, and the need to not build sea walls or other barriers that impede sea turtles from nesting.

Gary expressed hope that Cuba would learn from some of the better models around the world. Specifically in the ares of sea turtle friendly lighting, waste water treatment, and education for tourists who will be visiting sea turtle areas. View Gary's comments below.

When I returned from Cuba, my sea turtle adventure continued later in the month at the Tour de Turtles. Two of my graduate students, Jerry Comellas, and Joshua Calero joined me as we met up with Dan Evans, David Godfrey, and Gary Appleson again as part of a new team to capture, tag, and release the final two turtles for the Tour de Turtles kick-off.

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The Tour de Turtles was started in 2008. Sea Turtle Conservancy describes it as a "fun, educational journey through the science, research and geography of sea turtle migration using satellite telemetry. Created by Sea Turtle Conservancy, with help from sponsors and partners, this event follows the marathon migration of sea turtles, representing four different species, from their nesting beaches to their foraging grounds."

This year there are 14 competitors in the race from Costa Rica, Cuba, Florida, Nevis, and Panama. The University of South Florida Patel College of Global SustainabilityCu, where I teach, is co-sponsoring with Cubamar and Pro Tortuga in Cuba, one of the sea turtles from Panama in the race, named Tortuga Turista,

The kick off for Tour de Turtles begins at the Disney Vero Beach Resort. The resort is a model resort for sustainable tourism, sea turtle conservation, and protection. Key features of the resort include:

Amber lighting that keeps all negative lighting away from sea turtles.
Closing the beach gates at night to tourists.
Educating tourists to close their drapes after sunset if they are facing the beach
Daily beach cleaning.
Not serving plastic straws or lids with food and beverage at the resort.
Developing educational sea turtle programs so that guests will go away not only more informed but actually as ambassadors for sea turtle conservation and protection.

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Dr. Blair Witherington, Sea Turtle Program Manager for the Disney Animal Science and Environment team, and I talked about some of the ways that sea turtle conservation can help humans develop a stronger ethic to address common issues and concerns with sea turtles such as climate change, maintaining a clean environment, and reducing plastics in the ocean.

View Dr. Witherington's comments below:

The Tour de Turtles kick-off includes the release of two sea turtles at Disney's Vero Beach Resort, an evening reception at the Barrier Island Center with fun, food, music, and an auction to benefit sea turtles that evening, and the release of two more sea turtles the following day.

Below are a few videos from the past three years that capture some of the beauty, fun, and excitement of the Tour de Turtles.

I hope you will consider participating this year by supporting one of the turtles in the race and/or coming to the event next year.

Tour de Turtles Kickoff

2014 Disney Vero Beach

2015 Barrier Island Center

Tour de Turtles 2015 Kickoff from Coalter Digital on Vimeo.

2016 Brooke Vu produced a video log of the event that captures much of the beauty and excitement.

Dr David W. Randle - Director USF Patel College of Global Sustainability Sustainable Tourism, Managing Director International Ocean Institute Waves of Change Blue Community Initiative, and President & CEO WHALE Center.

Follow David Randle on Twitter

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World Leaders Have An Historic Opportunity To Support Migrants And Refugees
Two years ago, I traveled to the Bekaa Valley in Lebanon. I met a Syrian refugee family there who had recently fled Raqqa. Unable to find regular work, the family was depending on the labour of their 12-year-old daughter who was working in the fields. The family and this young girl herself would have preferred her to be in school.

The Bekaa Valley is among the areas hardest hit by the refugee crisis. Two years ago when I was there, some 770 informal tented settlements had sprung up and the valley was home to more than 410,000 refugees. These numbers have largely stayed the same two years on.

Today, more people are forcibly displaced from their homes than at any time since the end of the Second World War. A recent report by the UN agency for refugees, UNHCR, estimated that 65.3 million people were displaced at the end of 2015, compared to 59.5 million just a year earlier. Measured against the world's population of 7.4 billion people, one in every 113 people globally is now either an asylum-seeker, internally displaced, or a refugee. This tally is greater than the entire population of the United Kingdom.

In some cases, people are fleeing from poverty and lack of opportunity. In others, people are fleeing from conflict and lawlessness. Many millions need international support.

The Syria crisis has caused serious displacement -- 4.8 million Syrians have become refugees, and 6.5 million are displaced. This is the largest displacement crisis globally.

Many Syrians have fled to neighboring countries who are now hosting large numbers of these refugees. In Lebanon, Syrian refugees number roughly a quarter of the population. In Jordan, the number is estimated at about one in five people. Turkey hosts more than two million Syrians and Iraqis. The host countries and communities need international support too.

The 2030 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) -- provide a framework within which to respond to these large movements of people. The UN Summit for Refugees and Migrants convening this week in New York provides a unique opportunity for world leaders to come up with a blueprint for a strong international response to the needs.

What could be done to prevent displacement crises in future?

First, the international community should place conflict prevention and mediation at the centre of international peace and security efforts. Early warning and response systems are needed for when tensions emerge and to foster reconciliation.

Second, international support is needed to strengthen good governance and the rule of law, and to address structural inequalities. Promoting inclusive economic growth and sustainable livelihoods is critical for building peaceful and inclusive societies. These are long-term investments that are also critical structural prevention efforts.

Third, development actors can assist governments to improve their capacity for data collection and analysis on the root causes of displacement caused by poverty and lack of opportunity, to help design sustainable responses.

The organization I head, UNDP, will play its part. We provide support for host communities and help countries anticipate and prevent future crises. We promote inclusive and accountable institutions which can improve social cohesion, and drive inclusive development. We work to tackle inequalities and to improve access to justice and to basic services like education and health.

Going forward, UNDP will work to ensure that the inclusion of migration and displacement issues are priorities during the implementation of the SDGs. UNDP will also support at least thirty programme countries over the next five years to analyze and address the drivers of migration and of forced displacement. And we will work with partners to build the evidence and data base around migration and displacement. More needs to be known about the development impact of displacement in countries of origin and in host countries and communities.

This week, world leaders have an historic opportunity to address this issue and come together in a spirit of shared responsibility for the world's refugees and migrants. Let's remember those refugee children sent out to work instead of being able to go to school, and resolve to see that their needs are met.

This post is part of a series produced by The Huffington Post to mark the occasion of two critical conferences at the UN on the Refugee and Migrant crisis: the UN Summit for Refugees and Migrants (Sept. 19th, a UN conference) and the Leaders Summit on Refugees (Sept. 20th, hosted by U.S. Pres. Barack Obama, at the UN). To see all the posts in the series, visit here. To follow the conversation on Twitter, see #UN4RefugeesMigrants.

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IT'S OFFICIAL: Poop In Miami Beach Waters Causing SoBe Swimmer's Advisory Warning

Florida officials have concluded that swimming in the waters of South Beach is hazardous due to human feces in the waters, with the most likely culprit being a new pumping system intended to keep the low-lying island dry during next week's king tides. The Miami Herald reports:

Miami-Dade's branch of the state health department reported levels of the bacteria enterococci that exceed federal standards on South Beach and at the north beach of Crandon Park on Key Biscayne. The presence of the bacteria, which is found in animal and human intestinal tracts, is an indicator of fecal pollution. That pollution may come from storm water run-off, wildlife, pets and human sewage. “The results of the sampling indicate that water contact may pose an increased risk of illness, particularly for susceptible individuals,” read the advisory.

Speaking of things that are both low and lying, in May, I asked Miami Beach Mayor Philip Levine what he planned to do about scientific reports indicating the presence of human poop in the waters off his city.

Levine responded on Facebook: “Nothing because that it a big fat lie! Thanks.”

And in the three months since he made his promise to do nothing about water quality, he's succeeded wildly.

South Beach visitors can thank the Mayor for living up to his promise and doing absolutely nothing in the last three months, leading to a swimmer's advisory from county health officials, due to the high level of human waste pumped into near shore waters surrounding the beleaguered tourist town.

In fact, the only detectable response to Miami Beach's water crisis from Mayor Levine was blocking me on Facebook and Twitter to avoid reading reports on why denying science is wrong, why violating the open records Sunshine Law is wrong and why FIU scientist Dr. Henry Briceño (who must be feeling vindicated, but still upset) is absolutely, undeniably, 100% verified and independently tested as correct.

This week, Mayor Levine was in Toronto for the big film festival, skipped a contentious meeting about zika virus spraying at Miami Beach City Hall

It's an elegant solution to Miami Beach's difficult problems, fly a thousand miles away to hang out with celebrities.

It also means that Levine probably missed this report about the health of hundreds of Biscayne Bay swimmers being threatened by poop polluted waters from Miami Beach's expected King Tides discharge.

Meanwhile, the Mayor's propaganda machine - he doesn't take a salary, but does pay for a lot of full time self-promotion online - created the ironically titled theme “Rising Above” to describe how the island city is handling a swarm of poop in its waters and a swarm of disease bearing mosquitos on land.

Unfortunately, Miami Beach's efforts didn't include anything at all to warn swimmers of problems and in fact, the original flyer design depicted pristine blue water.

So I'll leave readers with this revised flyer design to share with their friends and loved ones, so they understand clearly, precisely what is going into the waters off South Beach today.

It's poop.

UPDATE: A reader has pointed out that today ― ironically ― is Global Coastal Cleanup Day.

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

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