What a trip we have had! Unfortunately this is the last one of my current contract so will have to wait a month to see these fantastic animals again. Today we finished off on a thrilling note with over 15 different sharks around the ship throughout the day! Some of which had been with us everyday. We saw on many occasions 5-6, or even as many as 8 sharks at a single time.
To top it all off (even though it might make you sad) we saw the natural hunting behaviour of the great white shark today. A young Guadalupe fur seal was playing around in the shallows but strayed a little too far into deep water. Here it was set upon by a relatively small and tenacious great white shark (only 8ft long). The fur seal managed to avoid a couple of lunging attacks from the shark and even jumped right over it’s attacker and started to swim off to the north. However, after a few seconds, there was a huge splash and thrashing at the surface and the seal did not surface again afterwards. A truly powerful and somewhat moving thing to behold and one that I don’t feel anyone will be forgetting in a hurry.
–DM Martyn, the Nautilus Belle Amie
This is an especially exciting trip for me! Many of those responsible for my decision to become a divemaster are here on the Nautilus Explorer this trip. Many beautiful underwater pictures that inspire us and tell so many amazing stories about the underwater world were taken by photographers like Ernie Brooks, Michael Aw, Christian Vizl and more… Wow! What an honour to have them onboard.
As usual on the night before the first dive, most guests can’t really sleep, the excitement is high with settings to adjust on cameras, and of course, the adrenaline is running before the first encounter with a great white!
–DM Mirko, the Nautilus Explorer
Today it has been a fantastic day. On all the dives we were surrounded by more than 4-5 sharks with incredible visibility. There was a lot of action at the surface cages and you could see smiles on the faces of our guests coming out of the cages with a lot of pictures and low batteries on their cameras. After a recharge for the cameras and a hot chocolate, they would jump back in the cages!
Some our guests also enjoy viewing the action from the dive deck, waiting to get the perfect shot of a shark jumping out of water to get the bait. Others get into the hot tub to relax after their dives. The water temperature is 20˚C with 80ft visibility. Don’t forget to bring your sunscreen!
–DM Pedro, the Nautilus Belle Amie
