Scarborough Sea Life Centre Aquarium Awards Turtle Fundraiser With a Vacation

By Michaela Bowness 

Scarborough, UK - A 15-year-old Scarborough boy’s passion for marine life has earned a week’s holiday on a Greek island for his whole family.

Matthew Newsome, of Norwood Street, Scarborough, raised a massive £240 in a sponsored fish count at Scarborough Sea Life Centre earlier this year.

The event to raise funds for a new sea turtle rescue centre on the island of Zakynthos was staged at Sea Life centres across the UK, and Matthew raised more than anyone else in the country.

“Matthew is one of our most frequent visitors, and he even represented us at a National Junior Sea Life Conference last year,” said the Scarborough centre’s Michaela Bowness.

“We were thrilled that he won the holiday and when I rang him to tell him he was really excited.”

Sea Life’s mission to help finance the new facility on Zakynthos was in part inspired by one of the centre’s most popular residents, loggerhead turtle Antiopi.

Zakynthian Yannis Vardakastanis, who arranged for brain-damaged Antiopi to move from a turtle hospital in Athens to her permanent home in Scarborough, is the man behind the new rescue centre.

Zakynthos hosts the biggest concentration of turtle nests in the Mediterranean, but adult loggerheads found injured around its shores face a full-day’s journey to Athens to receive treatment and care.

The new rescue centre will provide a rescue and rehabilitation service that could save the lives of many more of these endangered animals.

Matthew’s younger brother 11-year-old Ben and his mum and dad Liz and Tony were equally delighted with his triumph as they all get to go too. It will be their first overseas holiday in 10 years.

They will share their week’s adventure with top German fundraiser 10-year-old Leanna Knoop and her family from Hannover.

Scarborough aquarist Todd German is also going, and looking forward to joining Matthew and his family on a turtle-spotting catamaran trip and a tour of the island, including a visit to the new rescue centre.

Before they jet off next Monday, however, the Newsome’s will be visiting Scarborough Sea Life to say a big thanks to Antiopi, and to learn a bit more about sea turtles from Ben Day.

Sea Life centres have raised more than 100,000 Euros towards the new Sea Turtle Rescue and Wildlife Centre on Zakynthos, which it is hoped will be completed in time for the 2010 nesting season.

To view Scarborough Sea Life Centre Aquarium's web page on Zoo and Aquarium Visitor, go to: http://www.zandavisitor.com/forumtopicdetail-1370-Scarborough_SEA_LIFE_and_Marine_Sanctuary