My 2019 Christmas gift…Swimming with Sharks!

I was recently able to go on a bull shark dive during my short stay in Suva. The bull shark dives are located in Pacific Harbour, about 45 minutes outside of Suva by taxi. Myself and 6 friends arrived at about 7:30am. The dive began at 8 sharp. We didn’t bring any of our own equipment as the operation had everything we needed. One thing to keep in mind if you are wanting to bring your own gear to a shark dive is you cant wear any bright colors because you will be to noticeable.
We boarded a medium sized dive boat after being sized for wet suits, fins and BCDs. The staff loaded all of our kits for us. It took about 20 minute to reach the fist site.

The day is broken down into two dives. On the first dive you go to three different levels.
We started at the lowest level (about 25 meters) where we fist saw the bulls. We descended on a massive mooring line with the guides. Once down the guides had us kneel along a long wall and watch as a guide ran a garbage can filled with fish heads over us (The fish blood was green because we were so deep that red isn’t visible anymore which I found really cool). The rest of the guides were above, behind and on each side of us holding metal rods so the sharks wouldn’t get too close.
The next level (18 meters) we saw lemon sharks, white tips, black tips and massive moray eels. Once again we were placed down a wall while one of the guides fed them. The final level (10 meters) we were primarily with grey reef sharks but some white and black tips did join.
We then did a safety stop and headed back to the boats where there was tea and snacks. After a hour surface interval we headed to another site where we did the second dive.

The second dive we stayed at 30 meters and lay on our stomachs to watch them. It was absolutely AMAZING to see how close the sharks got and how they interacted with each other. There were also many big fish trying to get a little bit of the fish heads but for the most part the sharks beat them to it. We sat there for about 45 minutes and then began to ascend and do our safety stop.

The experience was incredible and I plan on doing the same dive or the hammer head one before I leave Fiji.
My one issue was they were feeding the sharks. Having large groups of wild predators dependent on humans for food isn’t good. However, after thinking about it, I realized if more people do these dives and see the sharks up close, they hopefully become more appreciative and comfortable with them. If there is less fear of sharks hopefully more people will be willing to help them in their natural environments. I do believe that cage diving for great whites or any other shark is not a good practice. It often is a very scary experience for the people doing them and people watching the videos at home just become more afraid.
In the end I believe feeding them is not the best solution, but it guarantees you see the sharks and find them less scary in general.

I would highly recommend going on a shark dive. Sharks are absolutely amazing creatures and after the dive I have a completely new view and love for them.