Handpicked experience · Colombo
Colombo, Sri Lanka
The green turtle is named for its fat, the hawksbill's beak is a sponge tool, and the temperature of the sand decides whether hatchlings are male or female.
Swim with sea turtles when you join this snorkeling activity in Mirissa
See sea turtles in the wild and have them glide and play alongside you while you swim
Bring your own action camera and take pictures of these adorable sea creatures
Make this snorkeling activity the highlight of your trip to Sri Lanka
Two species feeding on the same shallow ground, minutes from the harbour
Calm, protected water chosen for the conditions on the day
Masks, snorkels and life jackets supplied on most departures
A safety briefing and guidance from an English-speaking instructor
Small to medium groups, which keeps the animals settled
Two hours of snorkeling off Mirissa, on sheltered reef where green and hawksbill turtles feed close inshore. Masks, snorkels and life jackets are provided, there is a briefing before anyone gets in, and the boat transfer out from the harbour is short.
You meet at Mirissa, get fitted with gear and take the briefing, then head out to whichever protected stretch is working that morning. An instructor stays with the group in the water. Groups are kept small enough that the turtles carry on doing what they were doing rather than leaving.
The green turtle is the only sea turtle that becomes largely herbivorous as an adult, grazing seagrass and algae in shallow water. That diet is why it stays close to shore, and it is also where the name comes from — not the shell, which is brown, but the fat underneath, which the seagrass turns green. Grazing keeps the beds cropped and healthy, the same way sheep keep a hillside short.
The other species here is smaller, with a narrow hooked beak evolved for a single job: reaching into reef crevices and pulling out sponges that almost nothing else will eat. Its shell is the material that was traded for centuries as tortoiseshell, which is why the species is now critically endangered and why the shell has been protected from trade since the 1970s.
Sea turtles have no sex chromosomes. The temperature of the sand around the eggs during incubation determines it instead, with a pivot around twenty-nine degrees: cooler nests produce males, warmer nests females. A difference of a couple of degrees across a beach can tilt an entire season's hatch one way, which is why nesting-beach temperature is now closely watched.
Stay horizontal and still, keep a couple of metres back, and let the animal decide the distance. Do not touch, do not ride, and do not feed them: hand-feeding teaches wild turtles to approach boats, which is how they get hurt. A turtle that is comfortable will keep grazing with people floating above it, and that is the whole experience.
All of them have been protected here since 1972. The island's south coast is one of the few places where you can reasonably expect to see two species in the same short swim, on reef you reach in minutes rather than by an hour's boat ride offshore.
Getting to Mirissa is your own arrangement; the booking starts at the harbour. Sun on the water is severe, so a rash guard beats sunscreen on a reef. Cancellation is free up to seventy-two hours ahead.
Open it to pick a date and work out the price.
What the fare covers, and what to budget for separately.
The practical detail, and the answers people actually ask for.
Mask, snorkel and life jacket, a safety briefing, an instructor in the water with the group, the short boat transfer from the harbour and bottled water.
Because the fat beneath the shell is green, coloured by a diet of seagrass and algae. It is the only sea turtle that is largely herbivorous as an adult, which is also why it stays close inshore.
It is smaller, with a narrow hooked beak built to pull sponges out of reef crevices. Its shell was traded for centuries as tortoiseshell, which is why it is now critically endangered.
By the temperature of the sand during incubation rather than chromosomes, with a pivot near twenty-nine degrees. Cooler nests produce males and warmer ones females, so a couple of degrees can tilt a whole season.
No. Keep a couple of metres back, stay horizontal and let the animal choose the distance. Hand-feeding teaches wild turtles to approach boats, which is how they get injured.
This stretch of coast is among the few where two species feed on reef reachable in minutes from the harbour, and small groups mean the animals tend to carry on grazing rather than move off.
Yes — the booking begins at the harbour, and transfers from Colombo or elsewhere are separate.