My head-to-head with... sharks

Last year, I had the chance to swim with nice dolphins in Mexico and this time, I went to swim with… the mean sharks.

Ok. «Swim with» is not exactly it. Since I didn’t want to end up in the news, story of how I was chewed up in pieces, I dove in a cage.

This activity, really popular with the tourists, is in Gansbaai, which is about two hours from Cape Town. If you want to go there, you really should reserve in advance, because it is almost always full. We actually had some problems confirming ours. The first company sent us an email two days prior to tell us that all the activities were cancelled because of the bad conditions of the ocean.

The problem is that it was the only day that we could go there. Our friend, who wanted to do it badly, is only in the country for a few days.

Therefore, I opened my laptop and explored Google, even though it was less than an hour before my best friend’s wedding. Really classy you would say, with my hair done, my make up and my bridesmaid dress!

The first company that I called no longer had availabilities, but assured me that they would go on the sea all week long, as planned. I thought it was a little bit weird considering the fact that all the companies go to the same place…

I finally found a company with five spots for us. Yeah!

Monday morning, we left for Gansbaai. It is a little bit expensive (1700 rands, which worth 150 in CAD), but everything is included, even the food before, on the boat, and after.

They can’t promise that we’ll see sharks, because they’re roaming free in the water. So if they don’t feel like coming out on this day, too bad for you.

We wanted to go first, after achieving the really difficult task that is putting on the damn wetsuit – we looked like mean characters of a bad kids’ tv program! – we put on our mask and then jumped in the cage. I have to admit that it’s a little complicated to understand how everything works at first. There are a lots of metal bars, but we can’t touch them. Because we could become food for sharks. We can only touch the yellow ones. But the visibility was not that good, so I was scared to mix them up!

They attrack the sharks with big dead fish heads that they throw in the sea before bringing it back to the boat. It's absolutely disgusting. Oh, and talking about disgusting, here’s a really good tip for you : sea sickness pills.

One of us didn’t think she would need one so she gave another kind of food to the sharks, if you know what I mean…

So, once in the cage, your head is out of the water and when they yell «jump!», you take a deep breath and go at the bottom of the cage. Not that easy. Sometimes it worked, sometimes I was just floating and it was a mess!

I was on the side of the cage and twice, a shark decided that he wanted to eat the corner of the cage. Exactly like this:

I have to say that I was a little scared! I saw its sharp teeth up close. I prayed that the holes in the cage were small enough to protect me! Not exactly an easy task as I was trying to take pictures with my GoPro at the same time. I’m a little bit disappointed of the results…

 

I'd say that the best show happens when you’re on the boat. Once, the shark was just going nuts and he completely shredded the head’s fish as he was jumping. But I didn’t get to see it since I was waiting for him underwater!

Fortunately, I saw the exact same scene afterwards.

We would’ve prefered for the water to be more clear, but we can’t control that. Still, I can say that the experience was worth it!