Can anyone out there tell me what it is like to dive with sharks?
I would to love to here about some shark diving experiences.
Has anyone seen great whites?

The only sharks I have been around while diving was nurse sharke. They were aboue 5ft away from me and they were about 7ft long under a piece os metal from a suken ship. I can't explin the felling. It's like you are scared but you know they won't hurt you but you are also excited. I haven't seen a Great White but I would like to see one. If you come around Charleston SC e-mail me!

I have never been on a "Shark Dive" so all of my encounters have been wild. My most memorable was actually while snorkeling Looe Key in Florida. We were at the edge of a reef when an 8 foot Caribbean Reef Shark came right up to us. He circled a few times and then swam so close that I could feel the current from his tail. After his curiosity was satisfied (about 1 minute later) he just swam off. He was so close that I could have touched him, although I didn't since I am not a big fan of huge scars. It was an awesome experience. I was a little nervous because he was circling and coming so close but it was great.

My qualifying dives for PADI Openwater diver were done in shark infested waters off the west coast of South Africa. A place called Aliwal Shoal, a reef about 5km out to sea off the Umkomaas coast. The first time we saw sharks we gave them an impressive display of how fast we could swim in the opposite direction, after that we settled a little and on later dives could count as many as 34 Ragged tooth Sharks at any one given time. Some of them are curious and do come close to have a look but they generally could not be bothered with divers and just lurk around in their own territory. It was AWESOME and it gave me a new respect for the sea !!! My last dives were three weeks ago with dolphins at a re-hab centre on the Red Sea in Israel, much less stressful but I'll jump into the shark waters again feeling quite confident !!!

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Originally posted by Beefcake:

Beefcake, thanks for the story! It sounds like your experiences have been really awesome.

My qualifying dives for PADI Openwater diver were done in shark infested waters off the west coast of South Africa. A place called Aliwal Shoal, a reef about 5km out to sea off the Umkomaas coast. The first time we saw sharks we gave them an impressive display of how fast we could swim in the opposite direction, after that we settled a little and on later dives could count as many as 34 Ragged tooth Sharks at any one given time. Some of them are curious and do come close to have a look but they generally could not be bothered with divers and just lurk around in their own territory. It was AWESOME and it gave me a new respect for the sea !!! My last dives were three weeks ago with dolphins at a re-hab centre on the Red Sea in Israel, much less stressful but I'll jump into the shark waters again feeling quite confident !!!

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Do you know of other places to see nurse sharks? Like maybe, Key Largo?

Eriediver have you been to Key Largo? ARe there any sharks there?

I have been on both shark dives, and dives in which you just happen across sharks, I feel that you could not simply call the latter the only one "in the wild" because really even in the shark dive sence they are still wild animals. My only expericence with sharks has been in the caribean and the dives were rather fun, but shark dive encounters are really only fun once unless you take on the shark feeder role.

my experience has been that sharks are really more curious than anything else. on my first checkout dive we encountered a 6' nurse shark lying under the bow of an old barge. i think she was as frightened of us as we were of her and she kept her distance. however, my most memorable encounter came last year when i was spearfishing around an old liberty ship at 100'. as i was swimming along looking for fish, a 7' bull shark swam up from behind and "brushed" me. can you say abort dive?? thats exactly what happened. my dive instructor said that it was not unlike a dog sniffing someone it doesn't know. a buddy of mine actually had a bite taken from a snapper on his stringer on that same dive.

[This message has been edited by diverdave (edited 03-10-2001).]

There are nurse sharks in Key Largo. I have seen lots of them.