Everyone was still except for the bubbles escaping from their regulators as they exhaled. I looked toward the divemaster. He pointed two fingers at his eyes (the signal for "look"), then put his hand to the top of his head, fingers extended straight up ("shark"), and pointed to my right.
In the blue murkiness, between two large coral heads that rose like ghosts from the ocean bottom, a large shark was poised--watching. She looked us over carefully and when she was convinced there was no food, she turned and glided away into the blue gray shadows.
I watched in wonder. No panic. No racing pulse. Just awesome fascination and appreciation of a creature I'd never seen outside of glass walls.
Back on the dive boat after we surfaced, the shark jokes were replaced with fish stories. The divemaster proudly estimated the female shark at 8 feet. Of course, underwater everything appears about 25% larger than it really is.
Exaggerated fish stories aside, it was an encounter to remember.
Shark Encounter
Shark Encounter 2
Shark Encounter 3
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