Just when you thought it was safe......

.....to go back in the water!

I'm using a bit of artistic licence today and submitting my Film Star Friday a day early as today's activity was just too good to pass up. Plus I don't think anyone will mind apologies if you do!
Of course, it had to be Jaws but without Roy Scheider sadly!

We drove from Hermanus to Kleinbaa this morning for our shark dive. There was a good breakfast selection, but we'd already eaten at the guest house.
Many tourists had travelled in from Cape Town which was a 3 hour drive; that's the main reason we planned to do our dive while we were in the vicinity.

I'd researched quite a few operators and settled on a company called Marine Dynamics. They lure rather than feed the sharks and are the only company to have a marine biologist on board.
They do lots of research and monitoring of the sharks, in fact a couple of sharks we saw today were tagged.

We were first in the cage (with 7 others) and the drill was to stay above water until the spotters shouted 'down'. We were in the cage 30 minutes and although there were several sharks spotted, we only saw 1 up close as visibility was poor due to us being in the shallows.

Before we set off, we were told by one of the guides (a volunteer from London, who was studying marine biology at Southampton uni) that timings in the cage weren't set in stone. It wasn't a case of 10 minutes per group, rather just until it was felt we'd had the opportunity to see several sharks. Some groups got less time in the cage but shark activity was more, so we saw about the same.

The view from the deck was spectacular! We saw 6 sharks in total, the largest being 5 metres long.

The weather conditions were perfect when we set off, but the wind got up and the sea quickly got really choppy. There were a few green faces and puke on the floor.

Mr A summed it up and said we've done it the right way; humans in the cage and sharks in the ocean.

It was an incredible experience and one I'll never forget.