One of the first activities that caught my eye when I arrived in Cape Town was shark cage diving. I don’t even know WHY – I abhor going underwater without an air tank and regulator… but something about this just seemed like a “must do.”

I was toying around with the idea and had sent out a few inquiry emails, when another traveler booked into my hostel room. After chatting a few moments, she mentioned that SHE wanted to do it… so I shot off an email back to White Shark Diving Company, with whom I was already chatting with and we booked for two participants.

Just like that, I was registered to jump in the ocean with sharks INTENTIONALLY swimming around me.
We were booked into the tour for Monday, October 5th for a 7:10am pickup. We were scooped up on time (actually a few moments early!), and we headed off for a few more pickups in Cape Town. After we had everyone, we were about to set off when our driver received a phone call… the earlier sail had actually gone out and had to *return to shore* due to horrible water conditions. So, just kidding everyone, we are NOT going shark diving today! The van driver offered to take us either back to our respective hotels OR wherever we wanted to go in the CBD. Since we were already awake, Ila and I opted for “wherever in the CBD” and asked to be dropped off at a café for breakfast.

While at the café enjoying our surprise leisurely feast, we happened to have WiFi, and received an email from White Shark Diving Co’s registration office, asking if we were available again tomorrow to do the dive. We replied in the affirmative, and later that evening we got a confirmation pickup time of 10:20am on Tuesday, October 6th.
Ila and I were up and ready again the next day, and we were again picked up right on time. This time we were the last ones to join the group, so after our pickup, we were off to Gansbaai! I mentally crossed my fingers for about 20 minutes, at which point I pulled out my phone to read my book… which I finished in about 45 more minutes… and then I took a little siesta and then we were there! The whole ride actually took about 2.5 hours (we had a short bathroom break so in total we were in transit about 3 hours), and we arrived at the prep-office at 1:12pm (yes, exactly, I checked the time).

The 12 of us hopped out of the van and we had the option of waiting outside on the patio or inside, both with nice seating, for everything to get organized and ready to go. The first group was still out on the water, so there wasn’t a big rush. Most of us popped down on benches outside in the sun, and one of the girls from the dive company brought us out muffins and juice, and let us know there was coffee and tea inside as well. As we were all munching on our snack, we filled out our indemnity form and “boat roster,” aka attendance list. We also made sure everyone was settled up with payments (you provide your card information in advance solely to hold your spot, and it’s charged in full on the day of the dive), which took a few moments. Finally, we had our ship safety briefing just as the first boat’s passengers were returning, and then we were off!

The boat was small, smaller than any other motorized boat I’ve ever been in (non-motorized being like, kayaks and canoes and such), and there was some serious bobbing and weaving going on with the waves. Personally, I am SO glad I took an anti-nausea pill before we set out, because even with it I was still a touch queasy and several other passengers were so sick they ended up not going in the cages at all!

After about 15 minutes, we dropped anchor and our guide ran us through the tank procedure – essentially you’ve got on a wetsuit, weight belt and goggles, and there are certain areas in the cage, marked with yellow rope, that are safe for you to touch. Once you hop into the cage, you’re in a crouching position with your head above water, waiting for the guide to yell “DOWN LEFT” “DOWN RIGHT” or just “DOWN!” When you hear the signal, you take a deep breath, pull your feet off of the yellow bar in front of you, and drop into the water, looking in the aforementioned direction to check out the shark swimming by. Sounds easy enough, right?

Well, I suppose it would be, if the sharks just swam around the boat with any relative frequency! But… they don’t. So instead, two of our guides spent the entire time we were anchored either pouring fish gut water off the back of the boat, or waving a severed fish head back and forth in front of the cage (it was bolted to a huge rope), in an attempt to attract sharks to our area so we could see them. FYI, the fish gut water and severed head are lovingly referred to as “chum” in dive-speak.

I had made friends with a daughter and mom team from the UK, and we all decided that we would go in the last group of divers, so as to minimize our time freezing to death with wet hair after our session. After we decided that, we settled in to watch the action from the front of the boat. We actually had GREAT viewing from above, and we got to see all of the sharks that came by for both of the dive sessions before ours. It did take quite a bit of time, especially for the first group, to attract sharks for us to take a look at, but they did eventually come by! I’d say the first group waited probably the longest, at about 40 minutes in the water. When the second group was in, my friends and I actually popped up to the upper deck, above the cabin, to watch from an even higher vantage, which was pretty cool.

Finally, it was the moment of truth. Group three needed to get in the water… I yanked on my wetsuit, strapped on my goggles, and handed my camera off to another girl who had just come out of the water, to hopefully take some shots of me making a fool of myself.

In case you’ve forgotten… I HATE going underwater.

Hate. It.

I was the 6th person to load into the cage for this round, and as I was going in, a shark decided NOW was the ideal time to approach the cage. And approach he did… he reared up and actually smashed his face into the right side of the cage, chomping at the bars! Quite frankly I think I had the best view of him since I was sitting on the side of the boat, about to jump in the water, at the exact moment he chose to try and free my fellow tourists from the cage. But HOLY CRAP – they told us afterwards that he was the largest shark we saw all day, at approximately 4 meters long.

After he swam along, I hopped in the water and into my crouch-position to await the next shark. Becca, my UK friend, was last in and next to me, and for the next THREE sightings, both of us came up having seen nothing. At that point, we started to laugh, because we were the ONLY incompetent ones who seemed unable to spot the sharks in the water. Then, on drop four, we saw one! The shark swam right past the entire length of the cage, pretty slowly, as though he knew he was on display for us. I’d say he was less than 5 feet from the tank. We popped up, clapping and cheering that we’d finally seen a shark! We got one more drop, and Becca and I successfully saw another shark (or perhaps the same one), before being assisted out of the tank.

Once we were out, we yanked off all of our wet gear and got some dry towels.

Since we were the last group, the crew brought the cage back aboard and about 5 minutes later we set off back to shore.

Upon arrival, I basically JUMPED off of the boat because I was so cold – I wanted to be the first back to the office so I could be the first in the warm shower and the first in dry clothes. I succeeded, and was rewarded by with warm tea, a fresh salad, and hot “lasagna” as our return meal. (Quotation marks solely because this meal, while delicious, reminded me more of shepard’s pie than lasagna… there was no marinara in there!)

Once everyone was settled in to eat, we got to watch a video from our day at sea, which we could then purchase for R300. The video was actually really fun, but I personally decided against purchasing.

After the video and our warm meal, we hopped back on the van for our return transport home! This time instead of a gas station break, we got to stop at sunset at a mountain viewing point, which was pretty excellent in my personal opinion. It was a great way to send such an exciting day! After the stop, we loaded back in the van and most of us dozed off on the rest of the ride home.

Overall, I would say that all things considered, I had an excellent experience with White Shark Diving Co. and with shark cage diving overall. Even though our dive was rescheduled, I’m so glad they did it before we drove all the way out to Gansbaa    i and that they were so willing to do a next-day reschedule for us. The entire experience from arrival to departure was incredibly professional and at no point did I feel insecure or unsafe… and that’s saying a lot since we were jumping in the ocean with sharks! That said, I’d definitely recommend shark cage diving and particularly White Shark Diving Co., for one of your experiences when you’re in South Africa!