Lemon Sharks

Yesterday we went with Yuka and Mark on s/v Merkava to dive with the lemons sharks.  A few other boats went with us as well to snorkel (and lucky for me, watch Jake).  We went just out the pass to the left where there are lots of buoys to tie the dinghy up to.  We went down about 50-60 feet and just waited.  We didn't have to wait long.  There ended up being about 5 of the biggest sharks I've ever seen.  There were a few mommy sharks that looked like they were close to pupping.  They would swim at you with their big teeth hanging out and then when they saw the scuba bubbles they would turn.  It was a big nerve racking at first but by the end of the dive, Yuka, Mark and I were trying to herd them toward Andy so he could get better pictures.

The coral here is dead as it can be.  Apparently they had a cyclone here a few years ago and it wiped out most of the coral.  But it didn't seem to make a difference to all of the fish.  There were hundreds of fish of all different types and I even found a little hill where there were literally thousands of juvenile fish swimming around.   If the coral would have been alive this would easily have been the coolest dive I've done.  The fish weren't skittish at all.  I had a few swimming around my head and they caught me off guard a few times and made me a bit jumpy.

I'll keep the commentary low as I'm sure you just want to see the pictures.  They're really great.  Enjoy!