Our flight went out early this morning and all went as well as I thought it would.....which wasn't great, but we did make it. I knew that I would have problems explaining why my pack could not go through the metal detector (especially when I do not speak Spanish)....the last thing these frogs needed now was radiation! So my pack was very thoroughly inspected by hand. One of the inspectors was afraid of frogs... so to be "cute" the male inspector shook the container of frogs at the girl. Obviously....I did not handle that well....and that is all that I will say.

So we made it back to the States.....and into the Atlanta hub where I met with the USFWS inspector. I had every document he requested and things went well and soon I was on a flight back to Cleveland, back to the zoo, and then unpacking frogs, doing the daily itraconozol treatments and then home to bed!

We did it!

I just want to thank everyone for all of the support in the expedition to rescue what could be the last A. varius in the wild. Eddie, we couldn't have done any of this without you. Thank you to the "Gringo Team" for rescuing the frogs and being such a great group of people to work with. Roberto, thank you for answering all of my questions and showing this rookie the way. Hugh, Pam, Don, Brint, Kevin, Ron, and Joe, we would have never gotten the frogs back into the country without you. Doc and Doc thank you for helping me get everything together for treating the frogs in the field, and thank you for dealing with the "frog invasion" of the new hospital. Thank you to the hospital keepers for caring for the sensitive, high maintenance little buggers and getting them to spawn and produce hundreds of tadpoles. Thank you Scott, Woody, George, Mikey and Kristy for getting things ready for frogs/tadpoles at The RainForest. Thank you Kym, Kristen, Laura, and Sonia for all of the support and encouragement. And thank you Tim.......only you could make me want to come back home from such a beautiful country