Visiting the Karen Beasley Sea Turtle Hospital from North Topsail Beach

Every family that stays with us gets the same tip: go see the turtles. The Karen Beasley Sea Turtle Rescue and Rehabilitation Center in Surf City is a real working hospital for sick and injured sea turtles, and walking its tank room, meeting patients with names and back stories, is the kind of thing kids talk about for years.

Planning your visit

The center runs seasonal public hours and they change year to year, so check their current schedule before you build the day around it. It is about 15 minutes from our homes down the island. Go early in your week: if the kids fall in love (they will), you can time a second pass with a release. Turtle releases, when a healed patient is walked back into the ocean in front of a cheering beach crowd, are announced on the center's channels and are absolutely worth rearranging a morning for.

Turtle season on our own sand

Topsail Island is a nesting beach. From May through August, loggerhead mothers crawl up at night to lay; nests are marked and monitored by volunteers, and hatchlings boil out mostly August through October. If you are staying with us in season, you may find a marked nest within sight of your walkway.

How to be a good turtle neighbor

Lights out matters most: artificial light disorients hatchlings, so oceanfront lights go off by 9 pm in season and flashlights stay off the sand (red-filter lights if you must). Fill in any holes the kids dug before dark, take chairs and tents in at night, and give marked nests a wide berth. If you are lucky enough to see a hatch, stay back, stay dark, and let the volunteers direct traffic.

There is something fitting about it: the same dark, quiet, uncrowded beach that families choose on purpose is the one the turtles have been choosing all along. Take the tour, then come home to your deck and watch the nursery from the best seats on the island.