Sharks, Sharks and more Sharks

We were interested in SCUBA diving in the pass and invited Paul, Sundra, and Paul’s mom, Sontine, to ride over to the dive shop in the pass to check out the situation. We had quite the adventure just trying to steer the dingy amongst all the coral heads to get to the pass. Luckily we had Paul on board who could speak French with the guys at the dock who told us were to tie up, quite a challenge given the almost five-knot current ripping along the face of the dock.

The Tetamanu Diving Center located right alongside the famous South Fakarava Pass, a diver's paradise.

 Ten's of thousands of dollars of professional underwater photo gear littered the tables at the dive center.

As we walked towards the Tetamanu Diving Center (www.tetamanuvillage.pf) we saw literally mountains of camera cases and photo gear strewn about. I went in and talked to the famous Annabelle, a French Polynesian with curly blonde hair, who explained to me that they this week had been solidly booked for over a year .  Turns out thousands of groupers from across French Polynesia all congregate in the pass on the first full moon of July to breed. This also attracts hundreds of sharks. For dive photographers this is the Holy Grail. Consequently there were over 60 divers from around the world here to photograph the event. It was possible I could go dive with them, but it sounded like a very complicated dive given the depth and current so I decided to see about doing it at a later date.

I talked with an air traffic controller from Papeete who explained the best underwater photographers were all here. He pointed out four guys getting out of the water with exotic rebreathing equipment and super expensive underwater cameras. “They are a team working with the famous French producer Laurent Ballesta filming for French TV.” He also said a team from BBC was here, along with still photographers from all the dive magazines. Since the average camera/housing rigs I saw were in the $10,000 to $20,000 range, I realized I was totally out of my league with my little GoPro underwater camera. 

The air traffic controller showed me some photos he’d shot the day before, amazing pictures with hundreds of black-tipped and grey sharks filling the frame. He said tomorrow was supposed to be the big day all the groupers spawned (you think they’d give them a little privacy). Paul and I considered drift snorkeling in front of the resort but with the current running that fast -- and out to sea -- we decided to wait for another day.

From L to R:  Paul, Sundra, Meryl, and Sontine.

We had a beer and just enjoyed the ambience of the incredible setting right at the edge of the pass with dive boats zooming in and out (usually sideways in the current). It was interesting listening to the conversations of the professional divers as they sat with their beers recounting the day’s activities. Must be a nice life style.

Imagine staying here and diving twice a day.

Anabelle’s husband was getting dinner prepared for the divers, fish, of course, and throwing the scraps out into the shallow water where six or seven small black tips fought for the morsels.

Here's where the divers eat dinner and discuss the day's dive.

As Annabelle's husband cleans the fish for dinner, these little black-tips quickly gobble up the morsels. Note to self: Don't fall in the water.

We took a walk through the resort with it’s simple thatched huts with beautiful views of the lagoon. What a glorious vacation it would be to stay at the resort and dive twice a day, I need to recommend it to my kids (both certified divers).

Going back to the boat I somehow got on the wrong side of the channel and I was hitting coral heads right and left. I’d just put a new prop on the outboard and I somehow knew this was going to happen. It was getting dark quick and it was very hard to read the water to see the obstructions. With Meryl’s help we got turned around and motored very slowly back to the boat. Not sure Paul and Sundra will ever go for a dingy ride with us again.

The next day Meryl and I went over to the pass at slack tide and snorkeled with Meryl towing the dingy and me watching for sharks and filming with the GoPro. On the bottom, about 75 to 90 ft. down, we could see the flashes of the photographers going off and the bubbles slowly rising to the surface. While it was a long ways down, the water was very clear with an incoming tide and suddenly I could make out movement along the bottom, quickly realizing all those grey shapes with flashes of white were sharks, hundreds of sharks. As long as they stayed down there we were OK, but every once and awhile one would cruise by at a shallower depth.  Really wished we would have SCUBA’d the dive, but we’ll be back at another time.

We tried several locations to extend our snorkeling time and found over by the western edge, where the depth was only about 10 to 20 ft., was the best place for fish watching. The coral reef there was home to an amazing number of tropical fish, the usual parrot fish, sergeant majors, Moorish Idols, and a bunch of fish we couldn’t identify. Again, every once in awhile a black-tip would come cruising and put the fear of God in us. I know they are somewhat harmless but it’s easier to rationalize that in the boat then when a black tips is five feet away in the water. 

Back at the boat we checked the anchor and found we’d wrapped around a little coral head. I had Meryl stay on the boat and pull up the chain while I snorkeled and rearranged the buoys that float the chain over the bommies. You have to do this almost daily so you don’t get caught with a short wrapped chain when a gust hits.