Out of the Cage

These pictures were taken by Fiona Ayerst whilst on a film shoot at Dyer Island. As you can see this isn't a goldfish, and there're no bars between us. I'm far enough from the boat to be truly "hanging", but the funny thing is... You don't actually feel much fear. You're concentrating so hard on what you think the Shark (capital "S") is going to do next.

It helps to know a little about the body language of these super-predators, they do give subtle hints as to what they intend to do, both with regard to their intentions and their immediate approach towards you.

Needless to say, the feeling is incredible.

Something big is brewing...

The Ragged Tooth Sharks are back on Aliwal. The males have started congregating around classic areas like Raggie Cave and Catherdral.

The next few weeks should see number increasing and divers should be able to encounter numbers of up to 30 or 40 sharks at a time. I'll be out most days covering this convergance, which should be quite exciting. Throw in a few Tigers, Blacktips and Duskys in between and you have a great way to spend a month!

This whole natural cycle and many others worldwide will unfold before your eyes! There's something big happening to our natural world, and its going to hit you through the internet... Watch this space.

Red Herrings up the Marmellos

The Amazon system is so vast that its difficult to comprehend. So I suppose its logical to expect that one could easily end up in some fruitless backwater, miles away from where the action is. In our case we passed through Manaus without knowing that what we were looking for was right under our noses!

Having got our big Arampima, we set off in search of big Red Tail Catfish and Jau, and we'd been told that the upper Marmellos was the place. Dropping down onto the river in a seaplane, it looked nice enough, flocks of Red Macaws, and dense jungle verging fairly clear river water. On disembarking we were met by a blanket of humidity and a barrage of sand flies, no-see-ums, wasps, bees and other jungle bugs that need their own flight plan.

What transpired was a bit of a nighmare. The nice fishing camp that we were to stay at had a double booking, so we were ejected into the jungle for four days, catching our own food and sleeping on the edge of the river. Needless to say, the scars from the insect bites as I write this are still itching. We did spend a few nights with baitlines out for big Catfish, but with no luck. If the lines went in too early, the Piranah would attack the bait, and waiting until 8pm was a safe bet to get your bait to the bottom of the river. This was fruitless, we caught one Tiger Catfish of about 8 pounds, hardly a megafish!

Belem to Mexiana Island

Four hour delays are apparantly normal in Brazil, and after extracating ourselves from Sao Paulo, going through Belem to stick our heads in at the local fish market, we boarded a charter for Mexiana Island, smack in the Amazon delta.

After touching down on this waterlogged lump of tidal mud, we set to work trying to lure a giant Arapima from the dark leafy waters along the grassy stretches between the coastal forest. Folks here have actually changed the landscape to aid the proliferation of these giant fish, and before long Scott (our sportfishing guide) had one hooked up. We threw the 54kgs specimen back and the next day while fishing with an old man managed to hook the above lunker. These beautiful fish are, according to Dr Zeb Hogan, really prehistoric in many ways and actually have to gulp air every fifteen minutes or so.

This one also went back overboard, much to our relief, and with this catch our time at Mexiana was done. We packed up and headed back to Belem, and on to Manaus...