Thursday, October 9, 2008

Trip Report-Malapascua Island Thresher Sharks

From the Life is Beautiful Blog your basic first hand (and very excited!!!!) account of commercial Thresher Shark diving on Malapascua Island.

Thresher sharks (Alopias pelagicus) are one of our favorite sharky critters out there. For divers in California La Jolla Canyon is a great place to spot Threshers-if you're lucky.

Trip Report:

And the luck didn't stop there. The second morning dive, we left for Monad Shoal at 5.30am and saw 1 thresher shark at the Shark Point. Then we moved to the Manta Point... and... after waiting for 5 minutes.... there was 1 thresher shark coming and swimming towards my direction!!! Whoaaaaaaaaaa... it came closer and closer... my heart beats faster.. I thought, "Omigod... what am I gonna do?? If the shark attacked me, shall I swim fast or shall I stay still pretending to be a rock?" I tried to make as little bubbles as I could. The shark came really close, about 4 meters away! Then it turned to another direction... fffiuuuhhh.. but... it came back again! Waaaa.. and... guess what... there were 2 other thresher sharks coming!! Whoaaaaa.... three of them swimming and circling in front of us for more than 20 minutes!!! OH MY GOD!!! Wonderfuuuuullllll... our sights were locked to those three sharks. It was such a stunning view to see those pellagic thresher sharks with their weird shape-long tails swimming in circle, just like dancing in a group of three... sooooo cool!