Cheryl-Samantha Owen

Gansbaai, South Africa, is synonymous with the famed white shark cage dives, but on this sunny spring morning in November we were launching from the harbor with an even more exciting, adrenaline packed dive ahead. Hugging the sandy coastline  we combed the milky turquoise waters for the great white shark’s distinctive shadow. A number of ominous shapes morphed into straggling pieces of kelp before we eventually spotted their distinctive outlines.

Once anchored in the channel at Dyer Island I quietly slipped into the water leaving the boat’s shadow behind me and finned to the relative safety of the shallows. With the white sharks inshore, shark alley is the seals’ summer playground and within seconds I was part of the game. Mini torpedoes whizzed around me while their more relaxed siblings bobbed about upside down. It is prime mating season and with the big and even bigger bulls not keen on anyone but female seals in their territory the water was full of resonating bellows and a lot of bubble blowing!