SHARK CAGE DIVING: WOULD YOU RATHER?
Anyone who has watched shark week has a healthy appreciation for sharks. If you have never seen shark week, stop living under a rock ya bum, and tune in, it's one of the greatest weeks in television annually.
Anywho, of all the sharks in the sea, few are more terrifying than the great white. Massive, aggressive, and the star of their own hit movie series in Jaws, when ya hear shark, ya think great white. They are the lions of the deep, the kings of the ocean. In a few short weeks (8 to be exact) myself and a group of go-getters will be in Africa, diving face to face with great white sharks. Well, face to face with a cage in between, but that's close enough for me.
Lately, I have had a thought crossing my mind about this experience coming my way in the near future. Going back to the whole shark week thing, whenever they want sharks to come round, the shark diving folks chum the water. Chum, for those who are unfamiliar, is a mix of blood and fish guts that get dumped into the water, designed to attract hungry nearby sharks to the boat. I have lately been pondering a personal conundrum about this aspect of the journey, and I would love to hear your opinion. The question of the hour is: would I rather have them chum the water before I get in, or after?
If the water gets chummed before I get in the water, it could be a really cool thing to see from the boat. I would be able to witness how the chum spreads, and see just how long it takes a shark to respond to blood in guts (I feel like that's good knowledge to have in the case of an untimely water-related incident resulting in my blood and guts trickling out into the ocean around me). However, this means that when it's time to get into the cage and enter the water, there are going to be tons of hungry, riled up sharks just waiting for something to eat. If they see me just above the water hopping into a cage, they could take a shot at me, and that would suck.
On the flip side, if I am in the water when it gets chummed, it presents its own set of issues. For one, I am swimming in blood and guts filled water which is pretty nasty. Not only is that nasty, but in fact, it will make the water super murky. Then, all of a sudden, I am trapped in a cage filled with bloody gutty water waiting for the nightmare of all nightmares to come flying out of the gloom, mouth agape, to crash into my cage, causing me to suffer a mild heart attack.
It's a really tough choice. Granted, they will do it the way they do it, it isn't like I actually have a choice. But say you did have a choice, what would you choose? Would you rather hop in the water when the sharks are there, or before the water has been chummed? Let us know in the comments below, and come experience this madness with us on a future Africa trip!
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