Whale Sharks! Whale Sharks! Whale Sharks!
What a day yesterday...so amazing I don't even know where to begin and I'm finding it hard to remember the actual details! We headed off at lunchtime as normal, the sea was particularly calm which was a good sign. Captain Willy and Dr Rob were in charge. We headed southeast, went up the east coast then began searching the ocean almost directly north of Pumpkin Hill. We saw a few mini boils but they kept disappearing, apparently there wasn´t much food in the water. You could tell because the water was so clear! And you need the plankton to attract the small fish which attract the larger ones!
We find a decent boil, get ready at the back of the boat and suddenly the shark is there. We slide in and no kidding was he there! He was mere feet away! This vast gentle giant, upside down right under the boat. A huge male about 35 feet in length. He may have thought the boat was a sexy female shark! It certainly seemed that way as he was so close to it, even being vertical in the water his mouth practically touching the propeller. Eventually he turned himself the right way up, swam around us and then began to dive. I remember grinning so hard that water started to leak into my mask, and back on the boat I was almost in tears. It was the most amazing thing I have ever seen. Dr Rob was very excited about the behaviour witnessed too. Best of all I managed to get some fairly decent photos. This is amazing because I couldn´t see the lcd screen at all so was just pointing, shooting and hoping for the best! I am going to try and set up a separate slideshow for the whale shark pics, and maybe add all wildlife-related pics there.
We stay in the same general location in relation to the island but head further north out to sea. We see sharks at the surface a couple of times and the second group even gets in at one point but the shark dived almost instantly. Eventually we take a break and a few of us, me included, slip off the boat for a little blue water snorkelling and a pee break! Barely off the boat Captain Willy yells that a shark is there, I turn around and sure enough there is another (or maybe the same) huge whale shark. We swim towards him and watch him for a few minutes before he slowly dives out of sight. I hadn't taken my camera. Let's face it, it's not normally required when going for a pee! Going to the toilet will never be the same again!
We spend the rest of the afternoon chasing boils that disappear almost as soon as we reach them, until we find one last large boil and smack bang in the middle is a whale shark, perpendicular in the water, mouth at the surface feeding. The second group jump in and get some amazing views of him feeding and then slowly swimming under the boat before diving out of view.
We all gave our photos to Dr Rob and he has promised that we can get a set of everyone's pictures!
Back on the boat heading home I felt such a huge sense of peace and calm. Having seen and achieved something that I have longed for for many a year. What an amazing animal, talk about evolutionary perfection! I really hope that was not the last time I get to experience their grace and beauty.
Thursday 19 March 2009
Wednesday 18 March 2009
Thank you!
Just wanted to post a quick thank you for the comments people have been leaving. I'm glad you are enjoying reading about my adventures! I'm certainly enjoying having them. Although I am looking forward to some of the comforts of home when I get back, like a hot bath and seeing my dog!
An update on the dolphin encounter of two days ago. It turns out they were not bottle-nosed dolphins after all. some zoologist huh! but hey I have spent most of my time studying primates! Apparently they were rough-toothed dolphins. Not one I have heard of before but I have a dolphin book back home so can look them up when I get back.
Also we are wondering whether, despite his playful behaviour, he might have been distracting us from the main group which contained some youngsters. It is a pretty good theory. A long time ago a small boy fell into the gorilla enclosure at Jersey Zoo. The famous silverback of the group, Jambo, went over and appeared (to the onlooking crowd) to be protecting the boy from the rest of the group. Richard Johnston-Scott, the long-time keeper-scientist with the gorillas at Jersey wrote a book about Jambo and in it he describes how he thinks it was more likely that Jambo was in fact protecting his group from the strange creature that had fallen into their territory.
I went snorkelling around the Cafe Mariposa again yesterday afternoon and took a bunch of photos. They won't look very good because they need messing with when I get back home but I will put them online anyway. Picked up another 6 plastic cups and a plastic plate. God I hate plastic! Great snorkelling though. Saw a big fish, maybe a foot and a half to two feet long. Looked it up and it was called a Permit! They do give fish some strange names!
Oh I forgot to say, in case you haven't discovered it yet, if you click on the pictures in the slideshow it will take you to the online album where the pics are bigger and I've managed to stick in some basic captions. If I am repeating myself I do apologise! Well I'd better go and start uploading the 90 odd pics I had on my camera, then I'm off to the boat. Fingers crossed for another amazing trip!
Adios!
An update on the dolphin encounter of two days ago. It turns out they were not bottle-nosed dolphins after all. some zoologist huh! but hey I have spent most of my time studying primates! Apparently they were rough-toothed dolphins. Not one I have heard of before but I have a dolphin book back home so can look them up when I get back.
Also we are wondering whether, despite his playful behaviour, he might have been distracting us from the main group which contained some youngsters. It is a pretty good theory. A long time ago a small boy fell into the gorilla enclosure at Jersey Zoo. The famous silverback of the group, Jambo, went over and appeared (to the onlooking crowd) to be protecting the boy from the rest of the group. Richard Johnston-Scott, the long-time keeper-scientist with the gorillas at Jersey wrote a book about Jambo and in it he describes how he thinks it was more likely that Jambo was in fact protecting his group from the strange creature that had fallen into their territory.
I went snorkelling around the Cafe Mariposa again yesterday afternoon and took a bunch of photos. They won't look very good because they need messing with when I get back home but I will put them online anyway. Picked up another 6 plastic cups and a plastic plate. God I hate plastic! Great snorkelling though. Saw a big fish, maybe a foot and a half to two feet long. Looked it up and it was called a Permit! They do give fish some strange names!
Oh I forgot to say, in case you haven't discovered it yet, if you click on the pictures in the slideshow it will take you to the online album where the pics are bigger and I've managed to stick in some basic captions. If I am repeating myself I do apologise! Well I'd better go and start uploading the 90 odd pics I had on my camera, then I'm off to the boat. Fingers crossed for another amazing trip!
Adios!
Tuesday 17 March 2009
WooooooHooooo!
Wow! What a day yesterday. 3rd trip out searching for whale sharks. 3rd time lucky? That is what I was hoping for!
So of we go, nice group of people on the boat, heading towards the cayes off the southwest of the island first as this where sharks had been seen all week. I spot the first boil thanks to my trusty binoculars and a good bit of luck! Boils are what they call baitballs here. You may have seen them on wildlife programs on the tv, where small fish gather together in tight fast-moving masses. When they hit the surface or larger fish start to attack them they and the predators break the surface causing it to look like its boiling! You can actually hear it! Anyway, these are where the whale sharks come to feed.
So there we are at the first boil, it's not very big, but we get ready, sitting at the back of the boat, mask and fins on ready to slip into the water if teh captain gives the go-ahead. But nothing. No sightings of sharks, nothing but birds and fish. After a while we give up and try in another direction. Nothing there. So we head back to the first boil to see if it is still going and maybe if it has lured in a shark. Nope! I'm starting to feel a little flat now. Three trips and so far no luck, although it was exciting to see the boils it was more about the promise of what they might bring. Of we go again, moving eastwards along the north coast of the island. We spot dolphins but the soon disappear.
Then just when I have given up the trip as a lost cause I see a tern flying in the distance. I grab the binoculars again and follow it (hard to do in a boat that is rocking making the horizon zoom up and down!) sure enough I see it dive into the see. I point it out to the captain and he sees fish jumping! Yay! Another boil and this time a big one! Excitement ripples throughout the boat, it looks like this time we are going to get lucky. Back to the end of the boat, waiting waiting...can't see the boil, can't see anything as mask fogging up by now. Suddenly shouts of Shark! and...Go! Go! Swim to the front of the boat! There was a couple in front of me and a lady beside me. I dip my fins in trying not to splash and I'm in the water, finning as hard as possible whilst trying not to splash is damn hard! Unfortunately all I could see was the lady in front who was kicking up a storm of bubbles. I catch up with the couple who hug me saying Wasn't that amazing! I have to confess that I saw nothing! Apparently there was a manta ray too. Another animal near the top of my must-see list. I was devastated. Even though they only saw the shark very briefly before it dived, clearly not wanting company. I wasn't the only one who didn't see it. Two more people in the group that got in the water didn't see it. The second group who were waiting on the boat for their turn did see it at the surface. I almost wish I had stayed on the boat. The deep blue water was incredible though and what an adrenalin rush. My fins, I am discovering, might be fantastic for scuba but are not helpful when trying to snorkel silently!
I get back on the boat, trying not to feel resentful of the lady and all her bubble-kicking that had so obscured my view, especially when she starts giving me tips on what to do next time! Of we go again, I'm back to thinking that is the end of our adventure that day. How wrong I was. As we were coming round the east side of the island Captain Willy shouts Dolphins! And sure enough there are bottle-nosed dolphins all over the place. We watch them from the boat for about 5 minutes before we are asked if we want to try swimming with them. Are they kidding?! I was ready at the end of the boat before they had even finished asking. I didn't take my camera as I thought that might jinx my luck! Then we were in the water and I see dolphins swimming past me in every direction. We follow them and oh wow it was so amazing I can hardly believe it happened. First there were a lot of them, then it went down to one or two, but these two wanted to play with us! Now these are not some semi-tame Florida dolphins that are accustomed to daily human encounters, this isn't Flipper we are talking about here. These were truly wild dolphins, and they wanted to hang out with us! They kept checking each person out, swimming so close, within feet of us. If someone did a skin dive, or flipped upside down, so did the dolphins. I never wanted it to end! I'm not sure how long the encounter lasted, it might have been minutes although it was more like 5 to 10 minutes. The speed of the dolphins was incredible. No one managed to get pictures and what a shame it would have been to have spent all my time trying to get a picture instead of experiencing it. Something I have learnt from going to gigs!
Eventually our playmates left us and disappeared off into the blue. Back on the boat, everyone was so elated, high-fiving. I couldn't stop punching the air! I believe I even declared deepest love to the captain! I may have missed the whale shark, but the dolphins will live with me forever. I keep seeing them flashing just inches past my face, and I don't even need to close my eyes!
I had a great chat with Dr Rob too. I am hoping to help him out with a few things before I leave. And I have to give him my CV as there is a possibility that there may be some jobs there in the near future. I'm trying not to get my hopes up too much though as you never know.
But still, what an awesome awesome day! I'm going out with them again tomorrow so keep your fingers crossed for a whale shark this time! Preferably one who feels like hanging out at the surface for a bit!
Hasta la proxima, until next time....
So of we go, nice group of people on the boat, heading towards the cayes off the southwest of the island first as this where sharks had been seen all week. I spot the first boil thanks to my trusty binoculars and a good bit of luck! Boils are what they call baitballs here. You may have seen them on wildlife programs on the tv, where small fish gather together in tight fast-moving masses. When they hit the surface or larger fish start to attack them they and the predators break the surface causing it to look like its boiling! You can actually hear it! Anyway, these are where the whale sharks come to feed.
So there we are at the first boil, it's not very big, but we get ready, sitting at the back of the boat, mask and fins on ready to slip into the water if teh captain gives the go-ahead. But nothing. No sightings of sharks, nothing but birds and fish. After a while we give up and try in another direction. Nothing there. So we head back to the first boil to see if it is still going and maybe if it has lured in a shark. Nope! I'm starting to feel a little flat now. Three trips and so far no luck, although it was exciting to see the boils it was more about the promise of what they might bring. Of we go again, moving eastwards along the north coast of the island. We spot dolphins but the soon disappear.
Then just when I have given up the trip as a lost cause I see a tern flying in the distance. I grab the binoculars again and follow it (hard to do in a boat that is rocking making the horizon zoom up and down!) sure enough I see it dive into the see. I point it out to the captain and he sees fish jumping! Yay! Another boil and this time a big one! Excitement ripples throughout the boat, it looks like this time we are going to get lucky. Back to the end of the boat, waiting waiting...can't see the boil, can't see anything as mask fogging up by now. Suddenly shouts of Shark! and...Go! Go! Swim to the front of the boat! There was a couple in front of me and a lady beside me. I dip my fins in trying not to splash and I'm in the water, finning as hard as possible whilst trying not to splash is damn hard! Unfortunately all I could see was the lady in front who was kicking up a storm of bubbles. I catch up with the couple who hug me saying Wasn't that amazing! I have to confess that I saw nothing! Apparently there was a manta ray too. Another animal near the top of my must-see list. I was devastated. Even though they only saw the shark very briefly before it dived, clearly not wanting company. I wasn't the only one who didn't see it. Two more people in the group that got in the water didn't see it. The second group who were waiting on the boat for their turn did see it at the surface. I almost wish I had stayed on the boat. The deep blue water was incredible though and what an adrenalin rush. My fins, I am discovering, might be fantastic for scuba but are not helpful when trying to snorkel silently!
I get back on the boat, trying not to feel resentful of the lady and all her bubble-kicking that had so obscured my view, especially when she starts giving me tips on what to do next time! Of we go again, I'm back to thinking that is the end of our adventure that day. How wrong I was. As we were coming round the east side of the island Captain Willy shouts Dolphins! And sure enough there are bottle-nosed dolphins all over the place. We watch them from the boat for about 5 minutes before we are asked if we want to try swimming with them. Are they kidding?! I was ready at the end of the boat before they had even finished asking. I didn't take my camera as I thought that might jinx my luck! Then we were in the water and I see dolphins swimming past me in every direction. We follow them and oh wow it was so amazing I can hardly believe it happened. First there were a lot of them, then it went down to one or two, but these two wanted to play with us! Now these are not some semi-tame Florida dolphins that are accustomed to daily human encounters, this isn't Flipper we are talking about here. These were truly wild dolphins, and they wanted to hang out with us! They kept checking each person out, swimming so close, within feet of us. If someone did a skin dive, or flipped upside down, so did the dolphins. I never wanted it to end! I'm not sure how long the encounter lasted, it might have been minutes although it was more like 5 to 10 minutes. The speed of the dolphins was incredible. No one managed to get pictures and what a shame it would have been to have spent all my time trying to get a picture instead of experiencing it. Something I have learnt from going to gigs!
Eventually our playmates left us and disappeared off into the blue. Back on the boat, everyone was so elated, high-fiving. I couldn't stop punching the air! I believe I even declared deepest love to the captain! I may have missed the whale shark, but the dolphins will live with me forever. I keep seeing them flashing just inches past my face, and I don't even need to close my eyes!
I had a great chat with Dr Rob too. I am hoping to help him out with a few things before I leave. And I have to give him my CV as there is a possibility that there may be some jobs there in the near future. I'm trying not to get my hopes up too much though as you never know.
But still, what an awesome awesome day! I'm going out with them again tomorrow so keep your fingers crossed for a whale shark this time! Preferably one who feels like hanging out at the surface for a bit!
Hasta la proxima, until next time....
Sunday 15 March 2009
Only 2 weeks left! Oh No!
See this is why I hate going anywhere for less than a month. It has taken me three weeks to grow into this place and now I don't want to go home, and of course the days have started to rush past.
What a brilliant week I've had. Firstly it hasn't rained all week, YAY! Was getting very tired of being confined to my room. There's only so many episodes of CSI you can watch before wanting to murder someone yourself! On Monday I went diving for the first time, with a company called Cross Creek. Bobby Dan was my dive buddy. We went to the north side first to a site called CJ's Drop-off. So named because it is a wall dive. It was wonderful to be diving again but that first dive was mostly taken up with me relaxing into my stride (or even fin-stroke!). The second dive was at a place called Labyrinth. I really enjoyed this one, was very relaxed, there were a lot more fish to see. It's not like the Red Sea in the number of fish seen, but then I have heard people talking about over-fishing. I don't know how much of an issue it really is. But I guess with more and more tourists coming to the island wanting to eat lovely fresh local fish there may well be more pressure being put on the reefs. The other main difference with the Red Sea is the sheer number of hard corals there are here. It does seem a little strange to see such beautiful reefs and not find them teaming with fish. In places you do see huge numbers and varieties but in others it is very sparsely (no idea if that is spelt right!) populated. The dive boats are quite small, and can get a tad over-crowded. That seems to be the norm for most of the dive shops.
Tuesday I was recovering from sun burn! Wednesday I did my first ever whale shark searching trip with the Whale Shark and Oceanic Research Centre. This place is brilliant, run by Dr Rob Davis and Bryan Becker. The boat they go out on is bigger, a hundred times less crowded and they maintain strict rules about the encounters, something that is not always observed by the dive shops. We were not lucky enough to see whale sharks that day but I had the most wonderful afternoon on the boat, searching the seas. I did spot dolphins though and we were able to swim with them. It was a pod (is that just orcas?) of 18 spinner dolphins who were living up to their names and jumping high out of the water and spinning round before re-entry. You have to get in the water really fast and by the time I got in all I saw was a pair of dolphins disappearing into the distance! But I could hear them, all their squeaks and clicks, it was fantastic. The wind had whipped up the waves though, apparently to about 7 feet according to the captain, so it was quite a roller-coaster of a ride and really hinders the search for the sharks.
The next day we heard that whale sharks had been spotted the previous day right near where we had been, but in the morning. The research boats go out in the afternoon to avoid the crush of all the dive boats. By the sound of it 7 dive boats converged on the poor fish. It has rather put me off diving with any of the shops here, although there is a shop connected with the research place who you would assume know how to behave towards the sharks so I might give them a go. I don't want my encounter with the largest fish in the world to be one where I am angry and unhappy at how humans are behaving around the animal.
I did do something worthwhile on Thursday though. I joined up with Jeff from the Cafe Mariposa and we did a major clean up of the water and sea floor around the cafe docks. It took most of the afternoon and we eventually cleaned up a bin and a half of rubbish! Mostly plastic, but also including two toy trucks, two towels (one complete with clothes pegs!) and a pair of jeans! The really great thing about it was the snorkelling there was fantastic! There is a large pile of rocks that were dumped there, these stretch out towards the sea and they are being colonized by young coral. Towards the end of the rocks on the seaward side there were literally hundreds of fish, and I saw several cleaning stations where larger fish were either swimming very slowly or hanging vertically in the water allowing smaller fish to clean wounds and parasites off them!
Honestly it was the best thing I have ever done and I felt so great afterwards. I keep going back to look at our handiwork! I am planning to snorkel there again very soon with my camera and I'll try and get some good underwater shots. It's not easy as my camera isn't as adjustable as newer models so any pictures I take will be pretty crap until I get home and can 'clean' them up, which usually involves injecting some colour and contrast into them.
Friday involved another shark searching trip. Again they had been sighted the day before (story of my life!) by dive boats. Unfortunately the wind was again whipping the waves up pretty high and we had no luck, no dolphins either, although we did stop and snorkel on a lovely reef on the way back. I still had a brilliant time and I'm all signed up for the monday trip! Keep your fingers crossed for me! I took Terrie to Daves in the evening for yet another gorgeous meal. This time my choice was chicken with a red pepper cream sauce. Drool! Followed by Agnes' Swedish apple crumble from Cafe Mariposa! Double drool!
Yesterday I finally had the courage to venture to the free beach, called Chepes Beach. I've had my ear bent so much about the issues here it had made me a tad more cautious than I probably need to be. The beach was lovely, I didn't take any money with me just to be on the safe side, but no one hassled me and no one went near my stuff whilst I was swimming. The swimming is much better than at Bando so I was actually able to get some exercise! Trying to keep up with dolphins the other day has made me realise how unfit I am!
So that has pretty much bought us up to date. My skin is 99.9% healed up, I've lost weight and I feel fantastic! I'm off to the beach again this afternoon with Terrie, and I'll keep you posted on the shark searaching.
Take care all,
lots of love and hugs, Kim the Shark Hunter (in a non-shark killing sense of course!)
What a brilliant week I've had. Firstly it hasn't rained all week, YAY! Was getting very tired of being confined to my room. There's only so many episodes of CSI you can watch before wanting to murder someone yourself! On Monday I went diving for the first time, with a company called Cross Creek. Bobby Dan was my dive buddy. We went to the north side first to a site called CJ's Drop-off. So named because it is a wall dive. It was wonderful to be diving again but that first dive was mostly taken up with me relaxing into my stride (or even fin-stroke!). The second dive was at a place called Labyrinth. I really enjoyed this one, was very relaxed, there were a lot more fish to see. It's not like the Red Sea in the number of fish seen, but then I have heard people talking about over-fishing. I don't know how much of an issue it really is. But I guess with more and more tourists coming to the island wanting to eat lovely fresh local fish there may well be more pressure being put on the reefs. The other main difference with the Red Sea is the sheer number of hard corals there are here. It does seem a little strange to see such beautiful reefs and not find them teaming with fish. In places you do see huge numbers and varieties but in others it is very sparsely (no idea if that is spelt right!) populated. The dive boats are quite small, and can get a tad over-crowded. That seems to be the norm for most of the dive shops.
Tuesday I was recovering from sun burn! Wednesday I did my first ever whale shark searching trip with the Whale Shark and Oceanic Research Centre. This place is brilliant, run by Dr Rob Davis and Bryan Becker. The boat they go out on is bigger, a hundred times less crowded and they maintain strict rules about the encounters, something that is not always observed by the dive shops. We were not lucky enough to see whale sharks that day but I had the most wonderful afternoon on the boat, searching the seas. I did spot dolphins though and we were able to swim with them. It was a pod (is that just orcas?) of 18 spinner dolphins who were living up to their names and jumping high out of the water and spinning round before re-entry. You have to get in the water really fast and by the time I got in all I saw was a pair of dolphins disappearing into the distance! But I could hear them, all their squeaks and clicks, it was fantastic. The wind had whipped up the waves though, apparently to about 7 feet according to the captain, so it was quite a roller-coaster of a ride and really hinders the search for the sharks.
The next day we heard that whale sharks had been spotted the previous day right near where we had been, but in the morning. The research boats go out in the afternoon to avoid the crush of all the dive boats. By the sound of it 7 dive boats converged on the poor fish. It has rather put me off diving with any of the shops here, although there is a shop connected with the research place who you would assume know how to behave towards the sharks so I might give them a go. I don't want my encounter with the largest fish in the world to be one where I am angry and unhappy at how humans are behaving around the animal.
I did do something worthwhile on Thursday though. I joined up with Jeff from the Cafe Mariposa and we did a major clean up of the water and sea floor around the cafe docks. It took most of the afternoon and we eventually cleaned up a bin and a half of rubbish! Mostly plastic, but also including two toy trucks, two towels (one complete with clothes pegs!) and a pair of jeans! The really great thing about it was the snorkelling there was fantastic! There is a large pile of rocks that were dumped there, these stretch out towards the sea and they are being colonized by young coral. Towards the end of the rocks on the seaward side there were literally hundreds of fish, and I saw several cleaning stations where larger fish were either swimming very slowly or hanging vertically in the water allowing smaller fish to clean wounds and parasites off them!
Honestly it was the best thing I have ever done and I felt so great afterwards. I keep going back to look at our handiwork! I am planning to snorkel there again very soon with my camera and I'll try and get some good underwater shots. It's not easy as my camera isn't as adjustable as newer models so any pictures I take will be pretty crap until I get home and can 'clean' them up, which usually involves injecting some colour and contrast into them.
Friday involved another shark searching trip. Again they had been sighted the day before (story of my life!) by dive boats. Unfortunately the wind was again whipping the waves up pretty high and we had no luck, no dolphins either, although we did stop and snorkel on a lovely reef on the way back. I still had a brilliant time and I'm all signed up for the monday trip! Keep your fingers crossed for me! I took Terrie to Daves in the evening for yet another gorgeous meal. This time my choice was chicken with a red pepper cream sauce. Drool! Followed by Agnes' Swedish apple crumble from Cafe Mariposa! Double drool!
Yesterday I finally had the courage to venture to the free beach, called Chepes Beach. I've had my ear bent so much about the issues here it had made me a tad more cautious than I probably need to be. The beach was lovely, I didn't take any money with me just to be on the safe side, but no one hassled me and no one went near my stuff whilst I was swimming. The swimming is much better than at Bando so I was actually able to get some exercise! Trying to keep up with dolphins the other day has made me realise how unfit I am!
So that has pretty much bought us up to date. My skin is 99.9% healed up, I've lost weight and I feel fantastic! I'm off to the beach again this afternoon with Terrie, and I'll keep you posted on the shark searaching.
Take care all,
lots of love and hugs, Kim the Shark Hunter (in a non-shark killing sense of course!)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
