The water was warm but a shiver chilled my shoulders. We had jumped off the Zodiac into deep water and there was nothing to see below, except blue light fading to black.
Our guide swam toward the distant sea cliff. “Come on! Let's look for sharks!” A dozen people swam eagerly after him, including my son.
I started too, then inhaled pure saltwater from my snorkel and choked. I coughed it up and started swimming again, now panting. Despite struggling to catch up, the group was soon eighty feet away.
Alone in my patch of ocean, I felt motion behind. Tall swells rushed past our pontoon boat and came up fast. The waves poured over my head and snorkel.
I spluttered and blinked, trying to find the group. The guide screamed “Sharks that way!” and I turned toward them.
Was he pointing behind me?!
We were lucky to be snorkeling at all. Carter and I share the problem that our eyesight demands a prescription. The Evolution did not stock strong prescription masks and the cruise director Sergio was unable to find any in the little local dive shops. Luckily we had our swim goggles with us. So we just wore those and paddled along one-handedly, holding our snorkels upright and later using a rubber band. We were glad to have this solution because there were six different snorkel dives that week, which we did not want to miss.
The first day of snorkeling was a great success. We paddled about on our tummies, looking down at colorful fish and coral just a few feet below us. A playful sea lion swam right past the group. Floating was easy. Salt water is extra buoyant and so was the padding in our wetsuits. It was gentle bliss.
And the sights were wondrous. The best was a large school of hundreds of silver fish with big black eyes. Our guide Jorge grabbed our underwater camera, “Watch this!” He dove down about ten feet, level with the fish, and slowly videotaped as he swam through the school. They calmly split open around him and then closed up again as he swam past.
Toward the end a large black manta ray floated over the sandy bottom beneath us. Beautiful.
The second day, we jumped in near sea cliffs. We saw large colorful fishes with delicate fronds. The barnacles covering the rocks were just massive.
That afternoon there was a third snorkel. Gina was with a group that saw a white-tip shark. She was paralyzed but simply stayed put until it went away (Jorge took a photo you can see below – he loved our camera). It was worth it though, because later closer to shore they were surrounded by swimming penguins and another sea lion.
By the fourth snorkel, we were happy old pros. We jumped in noisily – to the irritation of a nearby pelican who had been taking a nap on shore! The highlight that day was a grand procession of golden rays – forty or fifty of them – majestically undulating their wings in harmony. Glorious.
I loved snorkeling.
The tour guides had saved the best for the last two days. For the fifth snorkel, we were in a new part of the Galapagos where the water was COLD. Jorge jumped in but we all hesitated, warm on the Zodiac. Carter and I had to grin when he declared “Ladies first!” Soon we were all in the water.
After a few seconds to numb up, we did not mind the cold as much. Then we realized we had company. The reef’s top was just a few feet below our fins and there was sea life teeming around us in all directions!
We saw brilliant orange, yellow and rainbow fish. We saw a giant conch with vibrant red flesh. And then lo – giant green sea turtles! While these creatures are not usually social, four of them happened to be feeding right next to us. Each turtle must have weighed over 300 pounds and they were between four and five feet long and most likely, far older than we.
We floated nearer to the turtles and they simply paddled right around us. They were busy searching for the tenderest green seaweed. We studied them and marveled. Fish swam quite close, nibbling at the green algae on their backs. The turtles swam by powerful thrusts of their front flippers, using their small hind flippers as a rudder.
Eventually we looked past the turtles. There were sea cucumbers and amazing starfish at least a foot wide. Investigating a crevice, I back-paddled furiously after coming nose to nose with a giant porcupine fish that could have eaten a poodle. (See Carter’s post – it was Patty)
Swimming over to Gina, she pointed under my legs with wide eyes. There was a giant turtle swimming slowly under me! I held my breath and looked down as its shell passed not three inches away from my face. The strong temptation came upon me – I would grab the shell with both hands and ride, ride, ride that turtle like a bucking bronco! Oh baby!
Now I knew it would be against the rules to do that, and in fact turtles do not swim as fast as a horse (or even very fast at all) and my brain rationally understood this. But for just an instant my fingers forgot about my brain and shocked me… by starting to move toward the shell!
Suddenly, Jorge loomed large. He was following another turtle and making a video tape with the camera and swimming right in front of all of us. A camera! I had a fraction of a second to control my fingers and wave my hand. Jorge smiled and snapped a photo. Thank goodness it was for our vacation album and not a mug shot. I looked over at Gina’s hands – also wide open. Had she been lured by the same irresistible compulsion? She would only smile.
In a parallel universe, we did catch that awe-inspiringly enormous shell. I picture us gliding together under the seas with our turtle companion, racing the fish and maybe spinning around wildly in the currents. Like on Finding Nemo.
OK, so now you can understand the kind of delirium that was upon us, when the sixth and final snorkel opportunity came along on our last full day in the Galapagos.
We willingly signed the whole family up for deep water with the sharks.
“Don’t worry, they are vegetarians,” Jorge explained. Plus, we were now back in the southern part of the Galapagos and the waters would be warm. It all made so much sense.
Steve, a veteran diver, gave us the scoop. “If a beginner sees a shark, they usually panic. You can tell by the big bubbles of air. What you want to do is actually slow your breathing down.”
“And then what?” we asked, hanging on his deep experience and eager to become sea salts ourselves.
“Why, swim closer to get a good look of course!” It all made so much sense.
So there we were ready to start our deep water snorkel. As we prepared to jump off the Zodiac, Katherine surveyed the open waters and asked Jorge one more time what to do if a shark came close. I was ready for him to say the same thing as Steve. I was ready to hear the word “vegetarian” again.
He looked at her and just for a moment hesitated. “Just stay close and I will keep an eye on you.”
Uhoh. Gina had seen one shark earlier in the week and recalled it was rather scary. Now she was glued to her seat. We decided that Carter and I would go in first with Jorge and the group. Gina and Katherine would wait until we were a bit closer to shore.
Only I went in wrong and came up coughing water, then fell behind. Now here I was, gasping for air in the open waters, while Carter and crowd swam ahead toward the safety of the sea cliffs, Jorge yelling “Shark!”
I could not get my chest to slow down. My mouth was wide open sucking in air. There was no way I could stop long enough to put my face in the water. I was blind to whatever swam below.
Thankfully, the Zodiac driver had been shadowing me as the straggler. I paddled over to the black pontoon and clung to the netting on the side, body still underwater and legs dangling down. Still shark bait but I was not ready to quit.
Eventually my chest relaxed and I caught my breath. By floating on the surface face down instead of treading water, a suggestion from Carter, I was able to work less and breathe slowly through the snorkel again.
There was nothing below me as far as I could see. I cast off from the boat and started swimming toward the cliff.
The boat moved ahead near the group and Gina and Katherine splashed in. “Hammerhead!” Jorge cried gleefully.
I could not see that far but Gina did. She reported “a long dark silhouette, easily ten to twelve feet long, unmistakably a hammerhead.” Yes, even when excited and fearful of her life, Gina uses French words like silhouette.
Damn I was missing a hammerhead shark! I swam madly toward the group, then realized I was kicking up lots of air bubbles and foam. Perhaps gentle kicks would be more appropriate. Definitely so.
Meanwhile Gina was watching the hammerhead. She said it was surreal. Why? “I felt like an idiot for being in the water, close to something that could eat me or Katherine if it chose.” But she stayed in the water. Katherine was unphased. Jorge was well under the surface, doing his best to get a picture of the hammerhead, regrettably not with our camera.
Well, I missed the hammerhead, but when I got to the sea cliffs I was in just the right place to see our next find – three Galapagos reef sharks, prowling on the sea floor in a line, just fifteen feet below us where the light was just getting dim.
I watched with admiration as Jorge this time grabbed our camera and swam down to investigate. He got some great shots (see below).
As we relaxed, it became completely normal that there were sharks below us. We did not bother them. They stayed about their business. It all made so much sense.
Continuing to swim parallel to the sea cliffs, we saw strange large blue glowing fish, more schools of yellow-tailed sturgeon fish, angel fish, and a striking golden pufferfish visible from many yards away.
A large black and white manta ray, called an Eagle Ray, capped off the morning.
It was a grand adventure, the experience headier once we realized we had loitered just yards away from the sharks and returned with all limbs and digits.
Later that day, the sharks surfaced right next to the Evolution, swimming so close that we could see them clearly as they prowled around us. They looked plenty big (see Gobble, in Carter's post).
I still love snorkeling, but next time you will find me swimming over a shallow reef with the pretty tropical fish. It just makes so much sense.
