2006-03-09

Shark week was always my favourite on the Discovery Channel

Coral Bay was a peaceful place many years ago, and according to a friend who returned from Australia recently, it remains so today. I think of it now because of a book I'm reading - Fresh Air Fiend, by Paul Theroux - though to my knowledge he has never ventured there, but in the chapter I am reading he talks of swimming with sharks, and that is what has turned my mind to the waters around Coral Bay. That, and perhaps also because it poured here yesterday and today it is trying out snow, and so I welcome the intrusion of nostalgic reminiscence from a place whose weather is more forgiving - a place that for four days I thought I might never leave.

Coral Bay is sleepy - its main road remains unpaved and with only one hostel and perhaps two small hotels I imagine its permanent population has not much exceeded the 150 it was when I visited the West Coast of Australia almost exactly four years ago. The place was fantastic; there was nothing to do but hike around the coast and lay on the beach - and perhaps most famously for the region, explore the Ningaloo Coral Reef.

The Ningaloo is Western Austalia's answer to the Great Barrier Reef on the opposite coast. At Coral Bay, it lies about 50 - 150 yards offshore - its relative proximity and pristine condition making it even more suspicious or fortunate, depending on your outlook. Perfectly, if you hike south on the beach for 10 minutes, you can enter the ocean at a spot where not only is the reef a mere splash from the beach, but also in a position where the current will carry you over the reef along its length.

The colours of the coral were somewhat unspectacular at the time - whether due to the season or some kind of disease I can't remember now - but the locals assured me it was a passing thing, and besides, the sheer number and variety of tropical fish were able to keep a snorkeler busy even in the very grey stretches of reef. There were green sea turtles, octopi, strange tubular fish, and, most freakishly, some kind of fish that smacked you in the face when you stuck head out of the water. I'd call them flying fish, and maybe they were, but it wasn't really the kind of thing I was into at the time - all this having knowledge of strange species or being able to recite their scientific names. All I really wanted was to see a shark, maybe swim with it a little.

I travelled alone at the time, though I kept running into two other solo backpackers - a guy from Austria named Peter and a German fellow - Christian. Both were interesting and friendly and liked beer, and if you know me at all, well that's pretty much enough for us to become friends. They too were interested in finding a shark, though I think they found my intransigence on the matter a tad eccentric and perhaps even morbid for an otherwise laid back guy. I remember swimming around with them, breaking off at times to explore an arm of the reef solo, just wishing I would find that shark first. If one of them would pop up out of the water and take off the snorkel to yell something, it was excitement tinged with jealousy that I felt knowing this speedo-wearing bastard might have spotted my shark.

After a day of this futile searching, we heard rumour of a shark nursery in the area that was literally teeming with Chondrichthyes (ha! Take that, crazy scientific naming community.) It was probably out of fear that we didn't ask more about what exactly a shark nursery entailed - I guess it added an element of excitement too - and the word 'nursery' just sort of implies friendliness and safety, and really, it was just seeing a shark in the wild that I was after; I could always deal with any bleeding later.

What I remember clearly from the following day was entering the water first - Peter and Christian lagging behind - it seemed their enthusiasm for swimming with possibly dozens of sharks was waning at that point, a trend that continued as we kicked our way toward the reef. It's kind of strange, the feeling of breathing underwater, swimming toward something exciting and dangerous, and at the same time being unable to shake the notion that somewhere behind you there are two Europeans who are more focused on witnessing your impending dismemberment than they are on discovering a shark nursery. I tried swimming more slowly, hoping they would sidle up to my position accidentally, but no, they were too wise for that simple deception. These bastards wanted to watch me die from a safe distance, and that was that. Finally, I popped my head up and spit out the snorkel. Peter and Christian stopped swimming immediately. Their masks squished their faces and made them look totally absurd and blundersome, like a couple of Clouseau-esque adventurers. 'Get your asses up here! Do you want to see some sharks or not?' They turned to each other, removing their masks.

'Why, do you see some sharks?'

'Yah, is they about to eat you?'

'Just come up here. I want to show you something.'

They considered this.

'Hmmm. No. You can go first,' says Peter.

'Yah, you are the crazy one. You go first. If anything happens we are right here to save you. It's better that way. Otherwise we all get eaten. And that's not good.'

I couldn't argue with that. But the suspense was killing me, and the sun was setting, and all I could think about was how I had heard that almost all shark attacks happen at dawn and dusk, making them somewhat crepuscular, and that my fins were flipping underneath my torso, and that, what the hell, who wouldn't want to eat me? We headed back to shore to regroup.

I'd like to say we happened upon the shark nursery the next day, that I fought off literally dozens of these cartilaginous killers, but instead we stuck around the main reef the next day. I was sick of their cowardice and annoyed with what was clearly more intelligent behaviour, so I swam off toward where the waves broke on the outer reef. Screw them, I thought. And there, of course, it happened. A six foot black-tipped reef shark was cruising the reef out in front of and below me. I stuck my head out of the water to yell to the cowards that they were about to get the show they were after, but they were too far away and would probably be suspicious anyway. I took a deep breath and swam down toward my new friend. I remember the pressure increasing inside my head as I closed distance. His eyes were ancient and vacant. It reminded me of some kind of primitive machine, like an abacus, only instead of counting beads this one kills you. But the encounter was over literally that quickly. I saw him, swam closer, he didn't like this, and with a couple of flicks of his tail/body, he was hyperspace. But it didn't matter; I was so jazzed, let me tell you. I didn't care if he was little, or that I was probably in little to no danger, I swam with a fucking shark, all by myself, and that made the day pretty damn cool.

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