Whale Shark !!!!

Lets talk more about the diving stuffs this time :-)

I saw my 1st Whale Shark in my life October last year when I was diving at Tokong Laut, Perhentian Island. It was nearly the end of the season. Just to let you all know diving season at Perhentian Island and other islands at the East Coast Malaysia is from March till mid October. I still remember the date tho, it was at 13th October 2008, a big day for me :-D Seeing Whale Shark is the dream of every single divers, so I am glad that I see 1 for now, I hope or I will definitely see more next time :-D

Before our sight of the Whale Shark in October, our Bubbles dive team saw the Whale Shark as well in August, it was 2 of them, it was 2 you know, how cool was that. Eric was doing the Advanced Open Water Course - Deep dive I think, with his students there, Rhi was leading the fun dive with her newly graduated Advanced Open Water students and they saw the Whale Sharks !!! According to them, there was a baby and an adult Whale Shark !! I wasn't diving that day so I totally missed that !! Sucksss !!

Luckily, it is my turn !! Haha..It was a nice morning for a dive of course, and we didn't expect to see it !!! We had 2boats depart for the dive, one boat consisted of me, Ronnie, Nicola, Lewis, Chze Hong, Timo and Florian. Timo and Florian were from Germany and they are only newly certified by Ronnie a day before the Whale Shark dive, and they were so lucky to see it !!! I did about 250dives then I got the chance to see it !! But I am glad I see it anyway because they are still lots of people never see it even though they dive for so many years, wish everyone out there GOOD LUCK !! Ok, back to the boat thingy, the 2nd boat is Jeffery from Scuba Dynamics with all his students and DM, they did their Advanced Open Water Course - Deep Dive. Chze Hong from boat 1 is actually going to follow the 2nd boat (All the students at Boat 2 are his friends) but he chose to dive with us as he was a leisure diver. Luckily he followed us because the 2nd boat didnt see the Whale Shark, felt sorry for them tho !!

This is the lucky Timo and Florian !!

And this is the lucky Chze Hong !!! Grrrrr !!!

I brought the underwater camera with me for the dive, of course !! Or else, I wouldnt be able to take some photos and videos of the Whale Shark !! We arrived at the dive site after 25minutes of boat ride. When we arrived there, there was a dive boat there and the boatman told us there was Whale Shark down there, he told us in Malay and I heard it and Ronnie heard it too, but we didnt tell anyone because we didnt want to upset anyone if we didnt see it. We quickly geared up and I was the last one to jump into the water, then we started to descend. At 1meter, there was lots of bubbles came out from my tank valve, I signaled them and told them to proceed 1st and I went up to change another tank. SHITTTT !!! At that time, I was thinking OMG, I might miss the Whale Shark !! Quickly changed my tank and then went down to search for them !! Before went down for the 2nd time, our 2nd boat just arrived. I managed to find my team and then dived with them and at the same time I was looking around, up and down, left and right, to look for the Whale Shark.

After dived for about 15minutes, I spotted a 3 legged Female Hawksbill Turtle at my depth of 18-20meter, she was at about 15meter. I signaled everyone and told them to go and have a look, snapped some pictures of her posing then we moved on. I was looking up and then suddenly I saw a huge shadow above my head, the shadow was at 10-12meter I guess. At that time, I knew that was a Whale Shark and I started screaming underwater and everyone looked at me when they heard me screaming, I signaled them "A Huge Shark", the shark signal, I guessed they were clueless at first and then I kept showing them the shark signs and told them to look up. Then they managed to see it, thank god !! Everyone, well was screaming as well, and we swam quickly but safely to about 10meter, and we swam with the Whale Shark for about 20minutes. I can see everyone was sooooo excited and jumped of happiness !!! We swam so near to it and I managed to snap lots of pictures and videos of it, I was so excited of course !! It was the best dive ever !!

This is the poor 3 legged female Hawksbill Turtle !!

This is me with the Whale Shark !!! Photo took by Ronnie !! A lots better quality !! :-)

This video took by me when I 1st saw it !!!

We went up to the boat after about 40minutes dive time, and it was the shortest time I ever spent at this dive site, because I was so excited seeing the Whale Shark and ended up using lots of air !! Ooppss !! Definitely worth it !! We were jumping up and down and kept talking about the Whale Shark when we reached our resort. Those divers at the 2nd boat didn't see it tho, too bad !! They tried their luck at Tiger Rock in the afternoon as Ronnie said the Whale Shark might go to that direction but they still didn't get to see it !! :-( Of course we talked about this Whale Shark topic many times even after few weeks after we saw it !! It was about 6meters long according to Ronnie as I am bad in measurement. :-D It was still so excited and I watch the videos and pictures many times lol And I get so excited when I told my friends !!!