July 13, 2011

Go Ape Beecraigs Go Shark Diving

Live life adventurously says the company motto. So what does that mean? Different things for different people I guess…  It might be canoeing; caving; mountain biking; climbing or even extreme cup cake making maybe?

How about the instructors at Go Ape Beecraigs? Do they walk the walk or just talk the talk? Well how about diving with three metre sand tiger sharks? Does that count?
Seven instructors from Go Ape Beecraigs went to Deep Sea World with varying degrees of excitement and terror to find out.

After a briefing by the diving instructor: “don’t touch the big sharks” and “don’t wiggle your fingers at the fish as they will bite them”, the first two brave divers, Sara and Alex were taken through for training. Sara and Alex were picked to go first as Stew, the manager, thought they were the most expendable! We didn’t tell them that… we just told them that they were the bravest.

Each diver was kitted out with a dry suit, some of us later wondered why they were called dry suits as they ended up pretty wet… sweating from the fear perhaps, or just a little leaky? And then we proceeded to do a bit of training which consisted of learning how to regain and clear your regulator (the bit you breathe through) if it gets knocked out, and how to get water out of your mask (the bit you see through and stops water going up your nose) without having to come to the surface. After a reminder not to touch the big sharks, it’s time to swim with the fishes.

While this was going on, the rest of us were taken down to the underwater tunnel to see what we had to look forward to. This initially calmed some nerves as the sharks didn’t look as big as we had feared and surely the thick glass must be making them look bigger anyway, alas not,  our guide informed us the glass actually makes them look a third smaller! Oh! On the plus side we were informed that they feed the sharks once a week and that they had been fed the day before so they shouldn’t be hungry.

A quick trip to the toilets was required to calm the nerves and we all came back to watch Sara and Alex enter the water. As they descended the shot line they were mobbed by fish expecting to be fed, and sure enough, like our guide had said, they both looked a third smaller, like oompa-loompa’s in diving suits, but not orange. They then went for a walk around the tank playing with rays and the smaller sharks while the big Sand Tiger sharks swam overhead. Those outside followed them around taking pictures and a small crowd of visitors amassed to view the new attraction, the Ape fish. All too soon they returned to the shot line and ascended to the surface and it was time for the next divers to go.

Andy and Nigel were next and if anyone was likely to get bitten we figured it would be Andy, he just can’t keep his hands to himself. At one point the dive instructor accompanying them had to put herself between Andy and a far too interested Sand Tiger Shark. Fortunately, or not, depending on your point of view, Andy emerged unscathed from his shark encounter. No scars for Andy to show off to his mates!

The final group consisted of Stew, Jo and Neil, who by this time had all been getting increasingly more excited, or maybe nervous, and were beginning to wish they had gone earlier! After about twenty minutes of exploring the tank and playing with the fish they made their way back towards the shot line and were about to pass a female Angel shark that was lying on the bottom, when chomp, the Angel shark pounced on a passing Bass.  Goodbye Bass, but the divers still had to go past. Evidently the Bass seemed to be enough for the shark as all passed unscathed, at least physically and made their way to the shot line and out of the tank.

So seven Go Ape instructors went to dive with sharks and all came back out to tell the tale. No one lost any limbs or even fingers, though two did get bitten, and it was sore.