EXMOUTH, WA
17th to 22nd July 2012WHALESHARKS at Exmouth
We arrived in Exmouth this afternoon (Tuesday) and had already booked a Manta Ray tour in Coral Bay with Coral Bay Eco-Tours for Thursday, giving us a day's rest after driving. When speaking with the Dive shop located inside our Caravan Park office, I found that the Whaleshark tour for Wednesday still had a couple of places available on-board, at a reduction of $55 p.p. because it was almost 5.30pm if we wanted to go.
So, traipsing back to the van, I asked Greg if he would like to indulge in some advanced snorkelling practice for Thursday's Manta Tour and he (being the animal lover that he is!!) said very decisively "NO". So saying ok, I promptly found something I knew he would just love: ULTRA-LIGHT FLYING!!!!! Yay.
So I booked him on the Ultra-light for Wed Afternoon and myself on the Whaleshark trip and we both had dinner and went to bed with lots of thoughts running around in our heads (not the least of which life-insurance was probably up there amongst the highest!!!)
Wed morning, I rose diligently at 5.00am and as quietly as possible, ate my brekky, got dressed and grabbed my pre-sorted bag of last night and gently let myself out of the van. In the dark I made my way across the park grounds to the front and found a chair to sit and wait on with a couple of other sleepy-eyed people.
Our bus with Ningaloo Whaleshark-n-dive arrived, along with 2 of our guides, Emma and Steve, and we took off for the 1/2 hour drive across the peninsula to Ningaloo Reef on the western side at Tantabiddi Jetty.
Danny, and two most wonderful guides, Steve and Emma)
Seeing the amazing fish, turtles (loggerheads, hawkesbill and green) blue-spot rays, and an abundence of hard corals was fantastic.
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| This ray was quite well hidden in the sand,( waiting for dinner to come his way???) |
The fish were amazing in this shallow depth of water - even large gropers & parrot fish around 10" - 12" long in a huge array of colour also.
This part of the trip was a little scary, because even though the water was very shallow, the inner reef sections is very narrow between the reef wall and the mainland and an extremely strong current flows in sections draining the channnel of the water that has flowed into it over the reef. However: the crew were very adament that we would all find that the outside the reef there would be little to no current even though the swell was between 3 and 4 metres out there today, averaging 3.5mtrs (Ho Hum! so they just had to tell us all that right now :P) We were given good instruction here on the rules regulating the swimming with these great sharks - the most important of course: Stay with and DO NOT GO IN FRONT of your guide!
The main rule is that a swimmers MUST NOT:-
1. attempt to touch or ride on a whale shark; (considering I can't free-dive very well - not much chance of that);
2. restrict the normal movement or behaviour of the whale shark (considering I'm 5ft 1-1/2 inches and a whaleshark is usually around 3 mtrs or bigger - not much chance of that by me either);
3. approach closer than 3 mtrs of the head or body and 4 mtrs of the tail (considering I was going to be too scared to let my guide out of my arms reach - practically no chance of that happening);
4. undertake flash photography or use motorised propulsion aids (considering I was going to be flat out keeping up with the swimming WITHOUT motorised propulsion aid and my underwater camera didn't have a flash attached - definitely no chance of that happening);
5. exceed 10 people in the water with the shark at any one time (I was in Group 1 with 6 people, so that wasn't going to happen either)
Anyway, onward ho and we cruised through this little channel out into the great blue yonder! A should went up and Group 1 (of which I was one), was told to very quickly don all snorkel gear and make haste onto the marlin board and be ready to jump in.
Doing exactly as we were told, we donned masks, snorkels, flippers and stood on the marling board excitedly breathing deeply and wondering what the heck we were doing here and why were we!!!!!! Then the decky yells "go, go, go" and in we go. O.M.G.!!! If it was possible to physically stop breathing because of absolute gob-smacking amazement, we all would have stopped at that moment.
In view was the most beautiful shark I have ever seen:-
This was my first photo - (But don't worry, they get better *lol* - shock reaction this one)
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| Also notice his bent pectoral fin (didn't appear to be sore/injured in any way though) |
Being only small, they think this fellow was only quite young at this stage
Through the Wildlife Conservation Act and the conservation and Land Mangement Act, the whaleshark is fully protected, and there a also many rules boats and people must observe whilst within the contact zones and the exclusive contact zones: Namely the where one boat operator is withing the exclusive contact zone he must not approach closer that 30 mtrs at any time to the whaleshark, and the 2nd operator in the contact zone must not approach within 250 mtrs of the shark whilst the 1st operator's people are in the water at the time. Any other boats approaching may not approach closer than 400 mtrs of the shark. Any operator is only allowed a maximum time of 90 mins within the exclusive contact zone and must fly the White/Red "WS" whaleshark flag.
As there was 3 boats out today, we restricted out times to 30 min per group so that all operators were able to offer their passengers some time with each of the 3 sharks we came across. The 2nd shark was about 7 mtrs and our 3rd and last shark which we had to ourselves for the 90 minutes because the others had gone back in was about 9mtrs or a little larger.
This was our 2nd shark (around 7 mtrs)
I was just beside the guy in the grey shirt (only 3-4 mtrs from the shark and guide Steve pulling me in each time I started drifting back, but the whalesharks are so calm and gentle that all terror evaporates the moment you look them in the eye Wow!
But jumping back in later on, all thoughts of this guy
vanished as we swam over to our last whaleshark of the day, estimated at around 9 mtrs or maybe a little longer.
And this was our beautiful 9 mtr shark giving us a gently farewell after we spent about 40 minutes with him before he headed off slightly quicker announcing "time's up guys - nice meeting you"!
After thi last shark, we headed out a little further south west and came to a break-away pod of about 30 or 40 Spinner Dolphins who held us and the crew spell-bound for around 1/2 hour or so, racing the boat, jumping and spinning in the air, and eyeballing us as often as we looked overboard *lol* The funniest guys to watch they were, but oh! so fast :-
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| The "Spinners"were the big hit with the crew today, not usually seeing so many together this late in the year! |
We headed to the north east now and along the way we found these beautiful "humpys" having a fun time in the deep :
After watching the Humpbacks for a while, we headed north east and made our way back through the reef wall into the inner reef area and had some lunch (a huge smorgasboard of cold chicken and beaut salads) and then started the return trip to the jetty & mainland. Along the way we were fortunate to see the Whalesharks closest cousin, a Leopard Shark, but unfortunately the camera was in in the process of being unpacked of its waterproof casing and we missed an underwater shot of him (he was around 1-1/2 mtrs).
A great day in the big, deep blue and am sure Greg had a great time in the Ultralight.......................
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