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Sadie, a desert tortoise that found himself a little too far away from his desert home, hitchhiked his way back, but not before stopping by KSL Broadcast House.
Tim Critelli is on the task of getting Sadie home. He said, "We stopped at the border and let Sadie see the ‘Welcome to Utah' sign and got some pictures of the welcoming."
In July, the tortoise was found roaming at a rest stop in Idaho, several states away from his home in the Mojave desert. Collette Beierly, who's also helping Sadie get home has a theory about how he got there: "Started to take it home and just decided it was too much for them and decided to leave it at a rest area."
That was the start of Sadie's travels. From Idaho the tortoise went to Washington. There he lived at a wildlife refuge. But with cold weather approaching, his caretaker knew she had to find him another home.
A California family read about Sadie in the newspaper and agreed to adopt the tortoise but had no way of getting him.
"There were 500 plus people in line who wanted to handle getting this tortoise to the Mojave Desert," Critelli said. Critelli and his sister, Beierly, were picked to take on the task of transporting the tortoise.
"There was talk from several people why Sadie couldn't go back to the Mojave Desert by himself. Well, one of the biggest reason was Sadie didn't have any thumbs," Critelli said.
The two are on a several day trip to Blythe, Calif., Sadie's new home. When he arrives, Sadie will get a police escort, a parade and the keys to the city.
E-mail: corton@ksl.com
