Diving with whale sharks

We really liked this.
Got to swim with 7 of these beautiful creatures.

So it’s vacation time👍.
We are in Cancun.
We know some locals so this trip cost $70 each and had to spend a little over $70 for the taxi and ferry for the 2 of us.
Really liked it.
We swam with 7-8 of these wonderful creatures.
Loving the “you know what” of this adventure.
As fun as this was, swimming in the cenotes was better.
All the best.
Andy

Very cool Andy - lucky man.

That is amazing! Did they react to your group at all or just go about their business?

Awesome. I've seen some videos of divers swimming with sharks on tv, not sure what species the sharks were. Some of the sharks really got into the divers giving them belly rubs, which I thought was hysterical.

So to be honest, I hated it at first👎.
We have a family member...a sister from another mister that goes back 35 years and more.

First and foremost I am an an animal lover and an avocate.

The first encounter was ugly.
Down right shameful 👎.

There were 15 boats with 8 divers each circling one shark that was hit by a prop.
They were corralling this poor creature.
I just couldn’t do it or have any part of it.

We then moved about an hour away and saw a large group.
They were beautiful.
There was even a baby about 12 feet long.
Hardly any boats there.
So the wife and I swam with this group.
We could swim along side of them for about 5 minutes and then give others a chance.
To me this was really friendly and I was now ok with it.
There were 7 beautiful creatures there and in my opinion not harassed.
If we never got to the second group I would have been totally embarrassed and never made this post.
Thank you.
Andy.

So to answer your question April,
The second group actually went about their business and ignored us completely.
They were just feeding on plankton.
We did our best to stay 3 meters away but actually got closer on accident.
Once the deck hand pushed me in and I was up and close to a very large mouth.

I have to give credit to our group for standing fast and refusing to participate in the ugliness of the first encounter.
Seriously props to them👍.

I think and believe it we refuse bad situations less will occur.
Thanks again.
Andy

Very interesting, I also would have found that first group very distasteful and not participated. Sounds like those tour guides have no respect for wildlife. I'm glad your group was able to find the pod and enjoy it without being overly disruptive to their natural behaviours. Thank you for sharing!

Originally Posted by Mech

The first encounter was ugly.
Down right shameful ��...
They were corralling this poor creature.

I've seen this happen both with stingrays in the Grand Cayman and nurse sharks in Belize. The guides are too worried about fulfilling the dreams of 'us' tourist that they do whatever it takes, even at the expense of the animals.

Stingrays were a disaster, nurse sharks turned out great.