Guadalupe Island - White Sharks (1 Viewer)

Just got back from an amazing 5 day liveaboard to Guadelupe Island, Mexico to dive with white sharks - I'll put more detail up on the blog as I get a chance but for now here's a few images y'all might enjoy:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/deep-blue/sets/72157608828809712/

Cracking photos. That must have been one wildlife encounter!

Amazing, must have been a rivetting experience!!

Absolutely awesome. I am completely gutted. Fabulous pix and obviously and amazing experience. Just how big were the sharks? With my limited TV experience they both seem to be females?

John

They were simply massive. the length of the cage area was 17 feet so we had a handy reference and a couple of the sharks were pushing that. November is when the big female sharks turn up so we benefited from that - at one point I had 4 sharks in a single view around the cage and would guess the smallest was up around 14 feet. We did see a couple of males on the last day though.

Journey back was like something out of the deadliest catch though - absolutely horrible - so the whale watching suffered; just a pair of fins and a pod of bottlenose on the way back

Great photos and must have been a real experience. I am hopefully going to cornwall next year to go in a cage with blue sharks. What camera is it you used.
Thanks,
Luke

Stunning shots! I'd be very interested to hear what gear you use for your underwater photography.

I am planning to do something similar next August from Gansbaai, South Africa. I'd love to hear from anyone who has done one of these trips from here in the past. Any preferred operators?

Thanks

Martyn

Thank you both. I use a canon a570IS digicam in housing. These shots were all taken without strobes (usually I use inon strobes for u/w photography) and with an inon ufl165AD fisheye lens.

Luke - you should enjoy the blue shark trip. I did one of the first ones a couple of years ago.

Martyn - I haven't dived Gansbaai (although not for lack of trying). I suspect all the operators may be similar so I'd try and pick the one that has the most cage availability for you throughout the day - ie one that has few people per trip or a number of big cages for more people in the water at a time. Basically you don't want to be the guy sat on deck waiting your turn whilst the only shark you see performs for someone else and then does one. Also allow a few days in the region to ensure you have spare days to try for a trip if you get bad weather. I was in capetown for 5 days and due to bad timing and poor weather didn't manage to get out (partially my own fault as I should've been more flexible about binning other planned activities earlier). In addition to the cage trips in Gansbaii you might also consider contacting Chris and Monique Fallows ( http://www.apexpredators.com/sharkmako.asp ) who do slightly different shark trips too.