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The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Sunday, September 22, 2002

Encountering the lords of the deep

• They’re all big, and with lots of teeth

By Chris Oliver
Advertiser Staff Writer

 •  If you go...

North Shore Shark Adventures vessel Kailolo sails daily from Slip 35 in Hale'iwa Harbor, weather permitting. The two-hour tours begin at 7 a.m.

Cost: Boat tour is $60, the cage experience is $120. Snorkels and masks are provided.

Reservations: 256-2769, hawaiisharkadventures.com.

HALE'IWA — Out of the blue, seemingly from nowhere, two, five, then (all at once) eight or nine sharks circle the submerged metal cage before disappearing into the blue.

Four miles out from Hale'iwa harbor the ocean becomes a deep cobalt blue and land drops away to a depth of 400 feet. We're in the shark zone. Five minutes earlier, captains Joe Pavsek and Chris Lolley heaved a 6-by-6-by-10-foot cage from the boat deck into the ocean, followed by a pail of fish trimmings and entrails.

Within minutes, the sleek pale shadow of a gray reef shark appeared by the side of the boat, a second fin broke the surface a few feet away, and passengers on Kailolo, the North Shore Shark Adventures vessel, hooted as they readied themselves for an encounter with the big predators that reign over the oceanic food chain.

If you're close to the underbelly of an eight-foot shark in Hawai'i waters, you may not live to tell the tale. But in the Kailolo's shark cage, a device made from aluminum tubing, you can get within inches of the sharks without being eaten.

Pavsek started North Shore Shark Adventures a year ago after 30 years of surfing and diving in the area and taking family and friends on his boat to see sharks. His company offers small group excursions with a cage from which snorkelers can observe sharks at crab-fishing grounds off the North Shore of O'ahu. Grey reef sharks, sandbar and Galapagos sharks are the most frequently seen, five to nine feet long, with an occasional 12-footer turning up.

On Kailolo's deck, anxiety mixed with excitement summed up the mood as eight passengers awaited their turn in the cage. No one was disappointed.

"Awesome, especially when you see their eyes up close," said Dylan Pearson, 28, visiting from Britain. Pearson said he wasn't a serious diver or snorkeler, but he jumped at the chance to get close to sharks. "They're incredibly graceful; they just appear and disappear so fast in all directions ... you feel their presence before you see them."

Pavsek said the sharks are attracted to the area by the leftover bait dumped from the crab traps. His boat tours take fish trimmings with them and toss them into the water to keep the sharks around long enough for shark fans to get a good look.

The ploy works. The trimmings, which fishermen call chum, acts as a dinner bell and the sharks torpedo toward it, inhaling the bait in one swift movement just inches from the snorkelers in the cage.

Depending on weather and ocean conditions, passengers can spend as long as they wish inside the cage, which holds two people comfortably and four snugly. The cage floats several feet from the boat, lashed to the stern with wire rope. On good days, visibility can be 200 feet, clear enough to watch sharks coming up from the depths.

Pavsek and Lolley have plenty of shark tales of their own: Lolley recalls taking out a BBC film crew on a day when 20 to 25 sharks approached the boat, including a 12-foot Galapagos female the crew named Bertha.

Pavsek encountered a great white shark when diving off Kahuku in the 1970s, an experience he describes as "trippy." "From three feet away, she appeared as big as a Volkswagen," he said.

Pavsek surfaced unharmed and the big man-eater followed at a distance before moving off.

"We've had people come on the tour who are deathly afraid of sharks," Pavsek said, "... yet, they go into the cage and undergo a transformation, their phobias disappear. We've had no dissatisfied customers."

• • •

They’re all big, and with lots of teeth

North Shore Shark Tours will show you the big toothy guys, naturally. You also may see dolphins and green sea turtles and, from November to March, humpback whales. The most commonly seen sharks range from five to 15 feet long:

The gray reef shark: Commonly found in the coral reefs and around atolls of the Pacific and Indian oceans. The gray reef shark has a white underside, a tail edged in black and may grow to eight feet long. It’s known for its aggression and contorted body posture when it prepares to attack.

The Galapagos shark: Prefers coral reefs and rocky beds in shallow to deep waters around islands in tropical waters. The Galapagos shark, also known as the grey reef whaler, is an aggressive species that is dark gray on top and has an off-white belly. Its tail has a black edge. There is a ridge running between the dorsal fins. The Galapagos shark was named in 1905 from specimens found near the Galapagos Islands. Most are about 10 feet long.

The sandbar shark: A small to medium-sized species (up to seven feet long) with a rounded snout which is gray-brown on the upper part and shades to white on the belly. The fins are a dusky color and have no conspicuous markings. This shark also has an interdorsal ridge, another clue to its identity. Sandbar sharks are found in tropical and warmer temperate waters around the world.