We sailed out in rolling waves and anchored near the seal island, lowered the 5 person cage and threw in the line with the bait made up of shark heads (GW's like eating other sharks)...immediately this brown and white thing came at it on its side under water...then more with tails and fins breaking the surface and slapping the cage as the bait line was pulled in and out (to lure them near the cage).
The Cage!
Everyone excitedly scrabbled for wetsuits. After a titanic effort I pulled mine on over my over Amarula-ed belly.
Quit teasing the shark
I was in the second rotation to go in and when the crew yell 'Down!' you hold your breath and duck under for a look....and i almost wet my wetsuit...to see this monster thing glide past the cage. Time and again sharks would make runs at the bait, come close to the cage and at one point one opened its mouth and moved in reaaal close....you pull your fingers and toes in when that happens. that cage looks like nothing compared to those big fishys. This engenders a great, fear induced comeraderie in the cage. We had in total about 3-4 sharks hanging around, the smallest 2 metres, the biggest 3.5 metres...he was a big one I tell ya. A couple of times the sharks were quick and in a flurry swallowed bait and line. A few times a face or front of the body would peek out of the water, but generally they were moving pretty sluggishly.
We were all starting to get a bit queasy from the swell so after a few hours we came back past the seal island, where pups cavort in the water near their impending sharkey doom.
But man that was cool and its nice to meet fellow travellers willing to throw themself into a potentially watery grave in the name of fun. I ordered a DVD taken of the hijinks so should be an amusing watch.
Manfred
No comments:
Post a Comment