White Sharks, the shakes and projectile vomit

It would be nice to report that my voyage to South Africa was uneventful, but unfortunately since it is me we are talking about, this was not the case.
Around 7 hours before I was prepared to wake up to start my voyage, I conveniently came down with the stomach flu: yes, firing out of both ends, painting my parent's bathroom wall with "the exorcist" like accuracy (and if my parent's are reading this, I really did try my best to clean the walls!)
Needless to say, I did not get any sleep that night, but my stomach seemed to calm down a little or at least for the time being.
On our flight between Montreal and Washington, things were quite uneventful, even quite enjoyable. That was short lived, because in our impromptu stopover in Dakar, Senegal, before continuing on to Jo'burg, my stomach came back with full force and I started with a fever and uncontrollable shakes. It was enough that the guy next to me asked if I needed any medication.

It seemed I had developed Ebola even before entering Africa!

I wrapped myself in blankets and prayed that it would all pass.
After our stopover in Dakar, things quickly improved, thanks to my best friend, Ambien, which allowed me 6 hours of drug-induced sleep. Upon waking up, my fever was gone, my appetite was back and I was able to eat again!
The rest of the way was quite uneventful (luckily), and we were now in Cape Town, South Africa.

Holy Phoque (As in Seal, the only thing in danger from a Great White)

The following morning, we awoke at 5 am to embark on a day trip to Gaansbai, home of The Great White Shark.
The ship's crew started off by chumming, or baiting the sharks with a piece of tuna and a fake rubber seal. Once they had the immense animal near our ship, we got into wetsuits and went into the cage. Even though they are probably 12-15 feet long and you literally needed to move your hands out of the way so that their flippers didn't hit you, it is actually a really calm and non-terrifying experience. It is just amazing to see such an immense and falsely- vilified animal up close and in its natural habitat. We stayed in the cage for around 45 minutes and just marveled at these magnificent beasts. Spielberg, you got them all wrong.



Not a bad way to start off the trip...oh yeah, my health is back to 100%...for now at least...heheheh (I shouldn't laugh).

Tah Tah

Underwater pics courtesy of Chris Mainella.