Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Rockrolex
Fantastic pictures, Dave. That last pic looks unreal. Is it real and is it in proportion? If so, how big is that mother?
|
Ed,
All of the photos are in proportion (1:1). What you see is what you get. The whale shark was about 40 feet long. It was the biggest of six our group saw in three days of diving off Darwin Island at the northern tip of the Galapagos chain. I only got to see one, and this was it. But it was worth it!
The silky and hammerhead sharks were between six and eight feet long, although some hammerheads could have been up to ten feet. The hammerheads are generally shy, although they will come close to check you out. The silky and Galapagos sharks are NOT shy, and the silkys are downright aggressive near the surface, especially if they catch you alone.
I had a very, very unpleasant encounter with two silky sharks when they found me doing a safety stop by myself in the open ocean. They kept circling and bumping me. They kept coming back no matter how hard I hit and kicked them. I have no doubt they would have had me for lunch if the encounter lasted much longer. Fortunately, I surfaced and the boat picked me up, but they the sharks hung around the boat for a long time after that. I still get upset when I think about it.
