Checked Out the Great White Sharks From a Diving Cage Today……

…..and they are pretty awesome—the longest we saw today was about 4 meters, or 12 feet, and they get much larger than that. I was in a group of about 25 people and three of us caught the shuttle at our hotel early this morning. We took a two hour drive north of Cape Town—an area that was new to me—along the Atlantic mountain range. The drive itself was interesting and we worked our way through the mountains to the village of Gansbaai.

There we had breakfast and an orientation before boarding the boat named White Pointer which was big enough to hold about thirty of us including five crew members. From there we went about 1 ½ hours to a restricted area near Seal Island. The ride never really took us too far from the coast and we saw penguins and seals in the water maybe a half-mile from the coast.

There were five diving boats anchored—the area is restricted to licensed dive boats—so we weren’t at all crowded. After we arrived they threw chum overboard to attract the sharks and then lowered the cage into the water. Six divers entered at a time and we had to wear wetsuits because the water is cold—really cold. The cage floats next to the boat and they throw a buoy loaded with bait—they used tuna heads and tails—and the buoy floats right in front of the cage.

You climb into the cage six at a time and the top of the cage is never below water—about six feet of cage is below water and maybe two feet above so you can float and breathe. When a shark is sighted the divers can go under water and watch the shark attack the buoy and bait.

We had most of the action early after anchoring—two of the sharks were probably twelve feet long and several other were 6 to 10 feet. They are pretty intimidating creatures. I don’t have an underwater camera so I was taking my pictures from aboard the boat. Unfortunately the sharks are unbelievably fast—they are surface feeders but swim low and attack from below at unbelievable speeds. I am attaching some of the shots I did get including one where you can see the shark underwater in the lower right corner of the photo--it is the second picture down from the beginning of this post.

We were out there about five hours then returned to the harbor and on the way back got to see two Southern Right Whales jumping out of the water in the distance. Again, unfortunately, my camera couldn’t get them but we were able to watch them for several minutes. I really do need to get a zoom lens.

Made it back to the hotel—it was a long day but worth it. I have one day of work here tomorrow then fly to Durban for one day’s work then start the long flight back through London to Houston. I should arrive Wednesday evening.