Craig and the Whalesharks

The long awaited photos finally came back from the processing lab (and I finally got around to seeing what I could do with them). Craig was really disappointed because there were only two or three decent photos in the entire batch, but I can't say I'd do much better if someone threw me off a boat in front of the world's largest fish and I tried to take photos with a cheap disposable water camera.

Craig thought it was an awesome experience and I hope he'll do it again if we go to Isla next July. The boats that day had to go further out into the channel to locate the whalesharks, so that's why the water is a deeper color of blue. He took a tour booked through Regi and Rebe at the Hotel Kinich because he wanted to be on a larger boat since another storm was coming up the pike. We also rented the golf cart through El Sol which is located at Kinich and didn't have a single problem with it the entire week. Marcela from Isla Beckons got us a discounted rate of $44 a day, and I think the whaleshark tour was $100. Some of the smaller boats on Isla were discounting the whaleshark trip to $80 while we were there, so you could definitely do better than the standard quoted $125 rate I see posted on message boards.

After he got out there and saw the way the smaller boats were being bounced around, Craig was glad he chose the bigger boat. The only downside was that the tour went to the Cancun side first to pick up some Italian daytrippers from an A.I. down by Playa del Carmen, but they did drop Craig off on Isla on the way back so he wouldn't have to make the trek back to Cancun with them.

Uhhhh -- can you guess which photo Craig didn't take? But this borrowed photo illustrates an important fact -- humans aren't the preferred meal of whalesharks! (It's phytoplankton.)

Here we have Craig and a fin.


And a whaleshark head!

Craig took a pretty decent self-portrait! : )

It'd be fun to go with him next time and take the photos, but that's not happening since I'd be hurling over the side the entire trip. And yes, Craig said a lot of the Italians on the boat were doing just that. At one point, he actually thought he was going to join them, but was able to tough it out. : )