The sky is overcast, but the wind is light and the seas calm, making for a very comfortable and relaxing transit for our first white shark cage diving trip of the season to Guadalupe Island. Being in the water and up close to a white shark is one of my favorite things in the world to do, and as I sit here writing this I have a feeling in my stomach something like I used to get on Christmas eve when I was waiting for Santa Claus to come. Well, something like that anyway. I’m excited, a little anxious, and I can’t wait to open my presents. In this case my “present” being a 15 foot torpedo shaped mass of muscle and cartilage with a mouth extremely full of teeth.
Not as scary as it sounds. In fact, not scary at all once you’ve experienced it. Awe-inspiring, humbling, enlightening, adrenaline-inducing, definitely all of those things. But I have never experienced anything resembling fear in my previous two seasons of cage diving at Guadalupe, and I have seen a lot of big sharks very close-up. For some people it’s not the fear of white sharks, but the idea that ‘cage diving’ isn’t really diving at all, and it would be boring to be stuck in a cage. If that’s how you feel, then you have not cage dived with us at Guadalupe Island. I love scuba diving, and I have experienced many beautiful dives with Giant Mantas, whalesharks, schooling hammerheads, sea-lions, humpbacks and beluga whales, but probably my best three dives of all-time have been from inside (or on top of) a cage at Guadalupe. It is that awesome!
Ok, I’m finished preaching. I actually wasn’t intending to when I started this log, I promise. We’ll be arriving at Isla Guadalupe around 0900 tomorrow morning, dropping our anchor in 240 ft of water just over a couple hundred meters from the cliffs on the sheltered side at the north end of the island, and hopefully spending the next four days in the company of that famous white shark ‘smile’. I can’t wait to see that first big dorsal fin breaking the surface and hear the shouts from the crew, “Shark!!” Stay tuned for updates from the shark files!
Captain Gordon Kipp
The first two dives on our last dive day in the California Channel Islands were really good, lots of life in the kelp, we saw a lot of bat rays, maybe 15-20. And one time as I was swimming through the kelp I looked up and saw two birds (cormorants) swimming next to me underwater! It was really nice. Dive 3 was not so good with very low visibility.
Everything is great, except the hot tub makes my beer warm.
Wolfgang
Everything has been perfect! Two beautiful dives this morning at Anacapa Island full of life in an amazing kelp forest. Although the water is cold the hot tub is always there waiting to warm you up. And the crew always trying to bring you more beer in the hot tub!
Peter
The diving was great today the vis could have been better… but the kelp looked like a underwater garden. Also some sea lions were playing at the dive site 40km off shore… quite a swim!
Stefan Pircher.
“The California Channel Islands”, das sind verspielte Seeloewen, 2m grosse Barsche, flinke Fledermausrochen, gut getarnte Engelhaie und die leuchtend orangen Garibaldis im Kelp. Eine Kulisse wie im Maerchenwald, in den diffus die Sonne scheint und sich die Strahlen brechen. Da ist aber auch die Bohrinsel “Eureka”, welche man bei laufendem Betrieb betauchen darf: ein Moloch, der als Fremdkoerper mitten im Pazifik steht und schon 1m unter Wasser komplett bewachsen ist wie ein intaktes Riff mit all seinen kleinen und grossen Bewohnern und uebermuetigen Seeloewen, welche die Plattform fuer sich als perfekten Rueckzugsort vereinnahmt haben. Mit einem Trockentauchanzug und 5mm Handschuhen laesst es sich im durchschnittlich 15 Grad Celsius kuehlen Wasser eine Stunde komfortabel tauchen. Sechs aufregende Tauchtage sind vorbei, jetzt sind wir bereit und aufgewaermt fuer 4 Tage Kaefigtauchen mit dem grossen Weissen…
Christiane Floren
Wenn man in den channel islands taucht, fuehlt man sich in eine andere welt versetzt. atemberaubende kelpwaelder wiegen sich in der brandung, die einen mikrokosmus fuer eine unzaehlige vielfallt von tieren darstellen. ein urlaub, den ich sicher nie vergessen werde.
Alexander Wasenbelz
The diving is amazing and after some days you get used to the cold water too. We have seen everything we wanted sea lions, angel sharks, cow nose stingrays lots more and lots of kelp which is interesting for diving. The sea lions are wonderful, playing around so fast and curious just gorgeous. Now we are pretty exciting for the Great White.
Claudia and Ewald
Bring on Jaws!!! Captain's Log for Guadalupe Island great white sharks and guest comments on California Channel Islands – July 31, 2010
