Muscle and teeth

(TOM) OK, We slept in Wednesday morning and I'm catching up on posting. This is my last one as we're about to go to Boulder Beach to see penguins and Cape of Good Hope today. So, now for yesterday's main event...

I'm not sure of the legal limit for once-in-a-lifetime experiences in one vacation, but if we've not passed it, we're certainly very very close. Tuesday, we woke at 5AM again, giving us our 4th straight night of 4-6 hours of sleep. We drover for two hours to Gansbaai and went out on a boat to Dyer Island. The sunrise as we drove through the mountains was breathtaking, but it is our time on the water that was the real highlight.

Thanks to a great guy named Theunis Esterhuizen, owner of Shark Adventures, the great white shark diving folks, we went to Dyer Island rather than Seal island to see our great whites. Theunis had been emailing me info for a few weeks before we arrived, gave me his mobile to call when I arrived, and when I rang him, advised me I'd be better off going to Dyer island (Shark Alley) on another carrier's boat, due to recent limited activity near Seal Island. And, he arranged for our spot on the other boat, texted us very detailed directions, and followed up after to make sure we had a good time. It is guys like this that make vacations memorable. He is awesome, and if you're here, you've got to work with them (http://sharkadventures.co.za).

Anyway, we saw a bunch of great whites; likely about 10 in all. Mostly "little ones" according to our guides. They were mostly 6-8 feet long (though all were VERY thick), and one was at least 12 feet. They said the big ones usually get up to 18-20 feet. I was fine with the 12 foot one, especially when I heard the "bing, bing, bing, bing..." of his fin banging along the bars of the cage I was in. No, I didn't poop in my wetsuit, but it is only because all of my body functions ceased to work for a few moments.

WOW! Those are absolutely beautiful, powerful, intense hunting and eating machines. What wonderful creatures. I never really felt afraid or nervous, I just had a spine-tingling buzz the entire time I was in there. The way it works is this; they go to dyer Island and release some fish oil and blood, then put an 8x3 foot cage over the side and tie it to the boat. It floats with about 2 feet of it above the water and about 6 feet of it below. Four people get in, and they toss a Tuna head on a rope off the left side and a fake rubber seal-shaped decoy off the right side. When they see a shark coming, they yell "go down" and wither "bait" or "decoy" so you know which way to look. The entire time they are tossing these things out and pulling them back in toward the boat in the direction of the cage so the sharks come REALLY close to the cage, often with their mouths open (the fin of one banging as it hit against the bars one time). Really, really amazing.

Poor Mo was really close to feeding the sharks her breakfast, and after about 20 minutes of trying to hold it down insisted we call the rescue boat out to get her. Since she was green, I agreed even though I was told it would cost 350 Rand. Luckily there were about 10 other people who wanted to go back when it arrived so it ended up costing us about 50 Rand, or about $8. I felt bad for her, but she was really happy to trade the action for a bit of firm land under her feet.

I didn't get any video of them from above, nor any shots with my camera when i was below. Usually they video tape when you're in the water and you can buy the tape, but theirs was not working so I was left to borrow a water-proof camera from a nice British man who is going to email me the pics I took when he gets home. In the mean time, I've uploaded a couple of ones taken from the boat. The sharks are so fast and powerful I missed several amazing things like a breach by a 10 footer that took a Tuna head and was gone before anyone even saw him. Really beautiful and awe-inspiring animals. Jamie, you have to do this at least once in your life.

Photos - I did not use the zoom lense for any of these photos. The sharks were that close:
- "The fin". Jamie, I realized when I was in the tank that because they attack from below, so by the time you see the fin, it would already have you...
- One powering past the cage. Dorsal fin to tail fin on this one was about 6 feet.
- Going for the tuna head.
- Coming out of the water after the seal decoy (this was "a baby", only about 6 feet long).
- Yea. About 3 feet from the cage. You can clearly see how the decoy got so chewed up...