Day
1
Transfers: from Durban
airport to Sodwana Bay.
2 dives per day (6 in total). You will stay in ground camps or houses and excellent food provided. We hope to see, and dive with Whale Sharks, Oceanic White Tips and Great White Sharks, not to mention the game fish, turtles, Mantas and other rays, plus sub-tropical and temperate fish species and dolphins.
Dive, then transfer to game lodge in Hluhluwe/Umfolozi reserve - it is very beautiful and romantic! We will drive to a camp there, which is self-catering, and pretty basic in keeping with the African wild experience we plan for you. Here the bush is more open, game more plentiful, elephants, and more chance of seeing lions, and leopards. The river is close by, so hippos and crocs are plentiful. (Buffalo are also all over.)
The drive from north to south is long, so we would spend a whole day out on a drive, taking breakfast and lunch with us. As our specialist tracker and ranger said to me "ever watched a spider hunting a fish, or frog? Incredible" So, for all of you, who thought it was only lion, etc. which were the Predators, just hold on!
Due to bovine tuberculosis, which is threatening the lion population, much research is being done, (this is caught through the lion eating and feeding on infected buffalo) so some lions are collared for monitoring purposes, but this does not mean they are tame. Far from it! The possibility of tracking and calling them is good, and exciting, as by now I am sure you can all imagine, and cannot wait for.
Day 6 will be spend on the game reserve with Robin Mathews, a master with lions, lion calling and lion tracking and other specific predators. He has studied wild dogs, cheetah and much more. He will have many tales to tell you in the evening, maybe even about Antarctica, or bee keeping. . .
On day 7 the vehicle will collect you from the game reserve and will transfer you to Protea Banks, but there will be no time for diving this day.
2 dives at the Protea Banks.
Transfer to airport for flight to Cape Town. GET READY FOR THE GREAT WHITE EXPERIENCE. . .met by WSP crew and taken to Gansbaai, booked into a beautiful lodge, where you will be served an evening Amarula whilst you watch the sunset.
The Great White Shark man, Craig Ferreira, will come up to meet you and share a drink and a real South African braai. Craig is famous throughout the world, for his lectures and knowledge, on the behaviour of the Great Whites, and highly commended by The National Geographic Society for his "fascinating insight into the world of the white shark and its unusual behaviour".
"Come face to face with the Greatest Predator on earth: The Great White" (of course in a cage!)
Experience lond days on beautiful ocenas, a rustic stone harbour, and large Black Sophie, the treacherous rock named by the shark men, when Black Sophie spews white frothy water, and the jutting rocks are visible at the mouth of Kleinbaai harbour, we stay home and wait for the sea to rest again so we can launch. Africa at its wildest, just 5 nautical miles out to sea the Great Whites Swim, we plough through the pounding surf, around Dyer Island and Geyser Rock covered in Cape Fur seals and incredible marine wild bird life, remains of old wredks have found their way to rest on the "The Rock", and form a backdrop behind the "boiling water" of seal life.
We throw anchor in the channel named "Shark Alley". Or as close as we can, depending on the weather, we chum, we wait, the gentle lolling of the boat the only sound next to the wind, and the noise of the seals, and then "suddenly" the first dorsal fin cuts through the water, slicing magnificently flipping over, the great white shows us it white belly and then surfaces. . . we gently lower the cages into the waterm while you quickly don your wetsuits, and we slowly lower you into the cage, all sound, all life disappears as you face this graceful, awesome creature and for that moment in time all pre-conceived ideas of what is and what was, disappear as you come face to face, a meeting, one million years in the making.
For all, either viewing, or in the cage, this is a spiritual experience.
Check out of the Lodge, after a morning dive, and the transfer to Cape Town.
End your African experience with a late afternoon free dive in the famous V&A Aquarium in the Waterfront, in Cape Town.
For more information on rates, please contact our helpline
Please note that this is a specialist trip, not just a holiday. A Padi licence is preferred, or an open water licence.