Da dum, Da dum

I was SO lucky enough to swim with the sharks this morning.  Hahaha that sounds funny.  Well yesterday on my friend, Shanae's, blog she invited anyone and everyone to go swimming with her with the sharks.  This is something that Kurt and I have always wanted to do but could never afford it.  So I happily wrote her a have-fun-wish-I-was-going comment.  The day before I checked Mark Lee's blog, who's a photographer and he and his adventurist wife went for their 10 year anniversary.  You know how these things always work in pairs or threes.  He has water housing equipment for his DSLR and had an awesome picture on his blog.  Anyways, I forgot about it and went on with my day.  Around 9-9:30ish Kurt heard the cell phone ring, thankfully, and it was Shanae asking us if we were still interested.  The group that Rob Potts put together needed one more person and they were going to offer us the last seat at a discounted rate.  Shanae suggested we talked about it and call her back.  I got of the phone and explained everything to Kurt.  His birthday is on the 8th of August and I suggested that he go for his birthday present.  Kurt was really excited!  After a minute in his own fablehaven he stopped me and said, "Why don't you go?"  It kinda took me by surprise.  "Well... I get sea sick, your birthday is coming up, and this is something you've always wanted to do."  Plus since moving to Kailua, Kurt has not had a man session to himself and I've had some fun girl's nights out.  Swimming with the sharks seemed like the best way for him to boost his testosterone.  But he was pretty admit and very convincing.  So I called Shanae back and announced that I was the lucky winner.  I was SO excited.  We finished watching our movie and went straight to bed so I could actually get up for my 4:30 am wake up call.  When I say go to bed I mean lay in bed and stay up half the night talking about how exciting the next day would be for me.  Then finish the night off with making fart noises and laughing hysterically like we were 10 years old.  We finally got tired and fell asleep.  Let me tell you 4:30 came pretty early and again felt really late.  I woke up three different times afraid that my alarm clock wouldn't go off.  At 3:30 am Kurt got up and I asked him what time it was.  Okay I had an hour.  As I fell back asleep and entered the dream part of my REM cycle I dreamt that I indeed had slept in.  Eyeyah!  I practically laid in bed for the last hour.  I arrived at Shanae's house with perfect timing and we we were off to pier 35 at the Haleiwa Harbor.  Before we got on the boat Rob offered me Dramamine which I gladly took and for the rest of the time was ever grateful!  Thanks a million Rob!  I would say, and I'm no expert, that when we got out there, there being three miles of shore, it was pretty calm.  The captain and his one man crew explained to us that they don't have to bait and wait for hours.  The sharks know the sound of the engine as being a grab or fishing boat where they get the left over bait and crabs that are too small to keep aka food!  It took us five seconds to stand up after the boat stopped and see the first shark.  It was amazing to me that I'd lived here my entire life, surfed for seven good years and I had to pay to see my first shark.  It was worth every penny.   Even though they don't have to bait the sharks, every minute or so the captain or his one man crew would throw pieces of meat to the sharks and they would gladly feast.  We broke up in three groups and every group got to be in the water for 20 min.  You step into the, I would say and someone correct me if I'm wrong, 4x7 ft. cage in the water with snorkel gear on and then they lower you away.  You drift away a good 15 ft from the boat and have fun looking like a fish in a fish bowl with cats all around you.  We had about 15 Galapagos sharks swarming around us, or maybe they were the same 5, but 15 is my guesstimate.  If we weren't sane and if the crew hadn't specifically told us not to, we could've reached our hand out and touched them.  They were swimming all around and beneath us, it was just amazing.  As if the day couldn't have gotten any better, as we were going back into the habor we saw a pod of spinner dolphins.  As Shanae said, "Killed two birds with one stone."  Thank you SO much Rob for putting this together and let me sneak my way in.  Shanae I'm so glad you called us.  You were the best person to go with.  Then thank you Kurty for suggesting I go.  It was so much fun!

These seven pictures are from Shanae.  I personally believe she should have a career in underwater photography.