Bye, Bye Tuna - Hello Jaws
Survived the Dive!Hi everyone,
No travel this week. Stayed home and finished the turkey instead. I thought from time to time it might be fun to re-cycle some past travel yarns. Here's one from South Africa last summer (their winter).
DAKTARI
FEAR FACTOR PART II: SHARK BAIT!
The largest predators in Africa are not the lions of the Serengeti. They’re the great white sharks of Gans Bay, South Africa. Rafe from Rio, Colleen from Newburyport and I are shivering with cold and anticipation as we wait to be picked up at 5:30 AM to go cage-diving with the Great Whites. Nobody slept very well last night. What am I doing this for? Just nuts is all I can figure.
Klara from the Big Apple and spouse Rena will get up late and take their “shark money” and go shopping. Sure sounds good to me!
The White Shark Adventure van pulls up. This is it. We drive to Shark HQ where a hot breakfast awaits. I hope the sharks are having a good breakfast too. Maybe they won’t show up today! This must be how gentlemen of the last century felt while waiting in the morning mist for a duel to begin. It’s early, it’s surreal and it’s scary.
We embark on “The White Pointer” – a 55 foot specially outfitted shark hunting boat. It’s a 45 minute ride through rough seas to the set-up point. The cage is lowered into the water. Tuna heads are attached to ropes as we attempt to imitate a smelly dead seal. Six of us suit up and clamber one at a time down into the cage. “It’s a tourist six pack,” I think to myself. We wait for the sharks. In addition to the wetsuit, I’m wearing a weight belt and a snorkel mask.
“Here he comes,” the dive master announces. I let the weights drag me under and breathe through my snorkel. The biggest creature I’ve ever seen cruises slowly by. Gotta be less than a yard away! It’s big, it’s toothy and it’s grinning right at me. “Do prey pray?” I wonder. Philosophy is interrupted as a wave swamps my snorkel and my left lung exchanges a bubble of air for a mouthful of water. Gagging and coughing I claw my way to the surface. But the lure of the great white is on me – I submerge again. In twenty minutes I see two more great whites. The last is bigger than our dive cage. I decide to call it quits.
I stagger out of the cage, grinning and high-fiving. Suddenly it’s too much – I jump to the rail for a quick puke over the side. I don’t feel nauseated or seasick. Just way too much adrenaline. Afterward I’m cold shivers all over and my knees shake.
Rafe goes in group #2 and stays in the longest- about 45 minutes. Colleen suits up but after seeing me grinning and puking simultaneously, she decides to unzip. I must be a scary sight! Only 9 out of 17 adventurers actually make it into the cage. And nobody wants seconds!
The wind picks up and the boat ride back is incredibly rough. One particular giant wave bounces Rafe off his seat and onto the deck. Ouch! A hot spaghetti dinner is waiting for us at Shark Headquarters. Surprisingly I’m starving and eat everything in sight. The van takes us back while the monkeys get married (in South Africa they say that whenever sun is followed by rain and a nice rainbow – in Brazil they say the widows are getting married. Same weather but different nuptials.) Tomorrow an even scarier challenge awaits – driving a rental car on the left hand side. Are we having fun yet?
The largest predators in Africa are not the lions of the Serengeti. They’re the great white sharks of Gans Bay, South Africa. Rafe from Rio, Colleen from Newburyport and I are shivering with cold and anticipation as we wait to be picked up at 5:30 AM to go cage-diving with the Great Whites. Nobody slept very well last night. What am I doing this for? Just nuts is all I can figure.
Klara from the Big Apple and spouse Rena will get up late and take their “shark money” and go shopping. Sure sounds good to me!
The White Shark Adventure van pulls up. This is it. We drive to Shark HQ where a hot breakfast awaits. I hope the sharks are having a good breakfast too. Maybe they won’t show up today! This must be how gentlemen of the last century felt while waiting in the morning mist for a duel to begin. It’s early, it’s surreal and it’s scary.
We embark on “The White Pointer” – a 55 foot specially outfitted shark hunting boat. It’s a 45 minute ride through rough seas to the set-up point. The cage is lowered into the water. Tuna heads are attached to ropes as we attempt to imitate a smelly dead seal. Six of us suit up and clamber one at a time down into the cage. “It’s a tourist six pack,” I think to myself. We wait for the sharks. In addition to the wetsuit, I’m wearing a weight belt and a snorkel mask.
“Here he comes,” the dive master announces. I let the weights drag me under and breathe through my snorkel. The biggest creature I’ve ever seen cruises slowly by. Gotta be less than a yard away! It’s big, it’s toothy and it’s grinning right at me. “Do prey pray?” I wonder. Philosophy is interrupted as a wave swamps my snorkel and my left lung exchanges a bubble of air for a mouthful of water. Gagging and coughing I claw my way to the surface. But the lure of the great white is on me – I submerge again. In twenty minutes I see two more great whites. The last is bigger than our dive cage. I decide to call it quits.
I stagger out of the cage, grinning and high-fiving. Suddenly it’s too much – I jump to the rail for a quick puke over the side. I don’t feel nauseated or seasick. Just way too much adrenaline. Afterward I’m cold shivers all over and my knees shake.
Rafe goes in group #2 and stays in the longest- about 45 minutes. Colleen suits up but after seeing me grinning and puking simultaneously, she decides to unzip. I must be a scary sight! Only 9 out of 17 adventurers actually make it into the cage. And nobody wants seconds!
The wind picks up and the boat ride back is incredibly rough. One particular giant wave bounces Rafe off his seat and onto the deck. Ouch! A hot spaghetti dinner is waiting for us at Shark Headquarters. Surprisingly I’m starving and eat everything in sight. The van takes us back while the monkeys get married (in South Africa they say that whenever sun is followed by rain and a nice rainbow – in Brazil they say the widows are getting married. Same weather but different nuptials.) Tomorrow an even scarier challenge awaits – driving a rental car on the left hand side. Are we having fun yet?
No comments:
Post a Comment