Guadalupe Great White Shark Diving Expedition 2016 in a nutshell
2016 was another successful trip. A bit windy but with plenty of shark action and great visibility.
This year, we went to Guadalupe in October when the big females are around. The 12ft/4m males that show up in August and September are still there at that time but they are joined by the larger females that can attain lengths of 20ft/6m. Most of the time, the females that we see are in the 14-16ft/4.5-5m range but they are still very impressive animals.
As always, there were a few slow periods in the cages but most of the time we had two or three sharks in attendance. At one point I’m sure I counted 5 different animals coming in an out of view. I would guess that we saw around ten different animals while we were there.
The great thing about Guadalupe Island is that the sharks are used to divers and therefore far from shy! Some of the bolder great whites gave us a few extremely close passes. Now and then, one would even bump the cage.
It is important to point out that they never acted aggressively towards the divers. When they did bump the cages, they were actually just following the bait towards to the bars. Occasionally, when they did this, they would inadvertently make contact as they were turning to swim away.
Regardless, it was a thrill for anyone who was in the cage at the time!
As mentioned, we had a bit of wind which limited some photo angles. When conditions permit, I like to try my luck at split frame shots as I feel that images of the white sharks with the island in the background succinctly tell the story of the whole adventure.
The wind wasn’t that bad but it made the cages a bit bumpy at times and there were a lot of bubbles right at the surface so this year’s split shots won’t be winning any awards 🙂
Most of our guests took a turn or two in the deep cage. I stayed in the shallow cages or on the deck so I have no pics to post from that perspective, but fortunately, there was plenty of activity in the surface cages to keep shooting.
There are only so many white shark images that I can squeeze into a trip report so if you would like to see LOTS MORE IMAGES OF GREAT WHITE SHARKS AT GUADALUPE ISLAND, please visit our new Flickr page where you can see all of this year’s trip albums. I’ll be loading trip image folders for each new trip from now on – whenever I come up for air.
