This past weekend, we had another great dive trip to Oshima. The water was only two to three degrees cooler than last month, but the air was cooler as the sun was somewhat unreliable. Water viz was awesome again.
We had lots of firsts on this trip. Two divers had their first night dive and one had their first deep dive. A couple encountered thier first shark.
There was a lot of sea life and our group was lucky to see large horn sharks on three occasions, including the night dive. Usually, the horn sharks I have seen here were two feet or less.
The Mother of all Horn Sharks
However, these were huge. The biggest was pushing two meters. Their heads were so beefy, like a big old Rotweiler. They were also much more active than the smaller ones I have seen.
On our night dive, we had an interesting encounter with one. He was attracted to our lights I suppose and came over to us and settled down about 5 meters away. I went by with my partner, giving ample space. The next pair got pretty close and examined really closely, making me a bit nervous. I saw the tip of the tail twitching a bit. I light signaled to the pair hoping they would interpret that as, Lets ease back a bit.
The Sleeper Awakens
After the pair came to join me and my buddy, the shark lifted from the bottom and began to follow the pair who were now facing away. I saw it all happening, and shined my light toward the shark to illuminate the situation. It just kept coming toward the rear of the two divers who were headed toward me, but they had no idea.
My buddy was scooting back as the shark looked like he was going to ran into the diver to my right. As the alarm in my light signal must have alerted them, they saw the shark coming toward them. Just as I thought the shark was going to hit the diver on my right, she finned away and the shark just dropped back to the bottom and swam away.
I kept my light on him as he swam into the distance and the divers all scrambled over an adjacent rock wall. As I was laughing in a release of tension, my laughter quickly faded as the shark turned around and started to come back. To my relief, he settled back down to the bottom and I scooted over to the other divers.
We laughed and recounted that story over and over again for hours over the next day and a half. I know those sharks only have plates for teeth, but for a moment during that dive, I was wondering how I was going to remove the shark from my diver
We had lots of firsts on this trip. Two divers had their first night dive and one had their first deep dive. A couple encountered thier first shark.
There was a lot of sea life and our group was lucky to see large horn sharks on three occasions, including the night dive. Usually, the horn sharks I have seen here were two feet or less.
The Mother of all Horn Sharks
However, these were huge. The biggest was pushing two meters. Their heads were so beefy, like a big old Rotweiler. They were also much more active than the smaller ones I have seen.
On our night dive, we had an interesting encounter with one. He was attracted to our lights I suppose and came over to us and settled down about 5 meters away. I went by with my partner, giving ample space. The next pair got pretty close and examined really closely, making me a bit nervous. I saw the tip of the tail twitching a bit. I light signaled to the pair hoping they would interpret that as, Lets ease back a bit.
The Sleeper Awakens
After the pair came to join me and my buddy, the shark lifted from the bottom and began to follow the pair who were now facing away. I saw it all happening, and shined my light toward the shark to illuminate the situation. It just kept coming toward the rear of the two divers who were headed toward me, but they had no idea.
My buddy was scooting back as the shark looked like he was going to ran into the diver to my right. As the alarm in my light signal must have alerted them, they saw the shark coming toward them. Just as I thought the shark was going to hit the diver on my right, she finned away and the shark just dropped back to the bottom and swam away.
I kept my light on him as he swam into the distance and the divers all scrambled over an adjacent rock wall. As I was laughing in a release of tension, my laughter quickly faded as the shark turned around and started to come back. To my relief, he settled back down to the bottom and I scooted over to the other divers.
We laughed and recounted that story over and over again for hours over the next day and a half. I know those sharks only have plates for teeth, but for a moment during that dive, I was wondering how I was going to remove the shark from my diver
