Whale Sharks 

Whale Sharks

Why Whale Sharks? At the weekend I was talking to one of our customers down and Putney Leisure Centre. He had previously done all his scuba diving in Kingston Upon Thames and had decided to change schools. He had found us under Dive Kingston and thought go for it... Anyway I'm waffling!!

This guy had done over eighty dives around the world and had never seen a shark and was starting to get annoyed. It reminded me of Whale sharks... I got into scuba diving in 1994 in one of the world's Mecca's for Whale Sharks; Utila in the Bay Islands of Honduras. I lived there for 27 months(970 dives) and never saw a one.

Two years later I worked in another Mecca for Whalesharks, Koh Tao in Thailand, and... you guessed it, never saw a Whaleshark. I was constantly getting emails from friends around the world who were of course seeing Whale Sharks and I was starting to think I would never see one, but of course I was wrong. I'd just had bad luck.

In 1999 I went back to Utila, Honduras to work again for Cross Creek Dive Centre and my luck changed. Every day we went diving the boat captain, Stirling, would take the long route to the dive sites by heading off shore to circle the island. Boy did my luck change!!! I saw 10 whalesharks in the space of a couple of months. Beautiful creatures.. so graceful and awe inspiring...and yeah, pretty bloody big!!

The most amazing sight was when one came up under the boat and tentatively nudged the bottom before swimming away beneath me. I was the only one in the water and got to see the whole thing as a private show...

Anyway, I haven't seen a Whale Shark for 4 years now but I'm sure I will see plenty more in the future.