GOING GREEN IN GABON

On a moonlit beach lapped by the Gulf of Guinea, I jump out of the way as a pair of giant flippers sends sand flying in my direction. Though we can’t make out the entire kayak-size bulk of the nesting leatherback turtle, the semi-darkness rever-berates with her heavy breathing as she slowly digs a burrow in which to lay 100 or so eggs.

My husband, Mark, and I are on the shores of Gabon’s Pongara National Park. While it’s just 20 minutes by boat from Libreville, the capital, Pongara teems with wild elephants, forest buffalo, marshbuck, duikers, and even a few chimpanzees. And turtles. According to an international study conducted a decade ago, Gabon’s warm equatorial beaches harbor the world’s largest nesting population of leatherbacks, to say nothing of three other threatened species of sea turtle.

It’s a bounty that has captivated me ever since I read how in 2002, Gabon’s then-president Omar Bongo Ondimba set aside more than