Don’t get me wrong, I can be quite happy looking for subjects to shoot in a tide pool. The little fish, crabs and shrimp can keep me entertained for hours. But there is something about seeing large animals in their natural environment and being in the water with them that just holds my attention. Big animals often are a big gamble. They don’t always show up when and where we are expecting. Take the first day of our trip to Tonga. After getting bounced around in an aluminum hull boat for about 6 hours in six to ten foot swells we found a momma whale and her calf. We tried to get in the water with her quickly only to see her head the other way and make it pretty hard for us to get close. Of course it was interesting to see the animals in the water, it sure would have been nice to see them for a bit longer. Of course, day three was much better, but there were a lot of hours of hurry up and wait. As you might guess patience is not one of my virtues.

I would say that the Manta’s in Kona were very punctual at least on the day we were there. Thirteen big animals in one place during a dive is pretty special. They were almost like a well choreographed ballet swimming through the dive site. I guess I was pretty wound up at the time because one of the mantas bumped me as I was swimming back to the boat and I did not even realize it. But there was video of it; I guess i should have gotten a copy.

If you feed them they will come. Well, seeing three 13 foot to 16 foot tiger sharks is pretty interesting. Add food into the equation and it does seem to assure that the sharks will show up. The challenge is how do you keep enough control so it is safe. Well, 4 foot aluminum hooks help, but so does a lot of local experience. I still have mixed emotions about feeding sharks. Feed them and you are teaching them to expect food from divers. Don’t feed them and you are unlikely to see them. But I digress. Having a mature tiger shark swim within 6 inches of your underwater camera will get your heart pumping and your breathing rate up a bit. Just glad all went well while we were there.