Turning Over A New Leaf: Episode 13 – ‘Tortimer’s Island’

13 August, 2013

Decided it was time to check out Tortimer’s Island. I suspect it’s a tax haven for those raccoons, lambchop features and the turnip seller set up by that turtle that used to be mayor.

No wonder Dalby was such a mess when I arrived when those in charge have been too busy setting up offshore banking fiddles.

Overpay their taxes? Yeah, sure. Funny how taxes came up in our first conversation together. I’ve got your number, matey!

Never mind, at least he’s not charging me for the boat trip.

Spoke too soon. The only thing you get around these parts for free are mosquito bites, and I expect the Nooks to nationalise them any day now and every time you are bitten by them having you charged for the ‘service’.

I think Kapp’n used to write songs for Björk.

Great. I’m being hit on by a mad frog.

It’s like being in Paris, except less slimy and not smelling of onions. No, wait a moment, I’m getting Paris mixed up with Blackpool during the tourist season. Easy mistake to make.

Relaxing is about the only thing you cannot do around here.

Leila is the child of someone around here, and ‘playing supermarket’ means she buys items from you for a fraction of what they are worth.

It’s useful to get some extra pennies for items such as shells that there is no point hauling back home at the expense of items that will sell for more at Re-tail (eg. the smallest fish!). I hoped playing with Leila this way might gain me some advantages around here, but this doesn’t appear to be the case.

You can get a wetsuit from the friendly gyroid as you leave the reception hall and enter the island proper to do some swimming and see if you can dive and catch anything underwater (you will have to do a bit of chasing underwater most times, so try to dive as close as possible.

It’s a great place to find lots of new creatures for the museum, for display at home, or to sell.

Watch out for the jelly fish when swimming – they sting!

The major activity on Tortimer’s Island is going on one of the many tours – which involves a fishing, bug catching, fossil digging or balloon popping game with a limited time to achieve a target in order to win medals to spend elsewhere.

You speak to Leilani at the front desk, pick a tour, and she will tell you to go and take a seat in the waiting area, whereupon shortly after you are transported to the tour site – a new land much bigger than Tortimer Island and roughly the same size as one a village is based in.

In some games it’s a perfect opportunity to acquire new fruits, flowers or catch bugs to take back, but watch out for games where you are only allowed to bring back set items to Tortimer (he puts on his stern face when warning you of this), or you will be disqualified and end up with nothing but a wasted five minutes.

There’s plenty of new goodies to be found on Tortimer Island proper. Apart from the diving, the shells sometimes offer hermit crabs or wharf roaches (the latter aren’t worth much when sold), and the fishing seldom disappoints.

Now swimming around happily in the Dalby Museum aquarium.

Once your basket is filled with items you want to take back home, you may as well head back – always with a lingering sense of sadness at leaving the island with its distinctive Hawaiian guitar and xylophone theme tune behind.