SHARK !!!!!!

Last Monday, the 19th of Oct, I returned from a great diving trip to Nassau with 3 of my dive buddies: Cindy, Deena and Larissa.

I usually schlep around my dinosaur of an underwater SLR camera, but decided to wait until I got to our destination to rent a modern 12MP digital camera. Wow !!! I fell in love with it immediately. It was great to see what I had just shot and delete and re-do if I didn't like it.

I think I had the most fun with this camera on our 2 shark dives. We went to a place called Shark Wall, where for some reason, Caribbean Reef Sharks are plentiful. We dove side by side peacefully with the sharks. Once in awhile, they would curiously come nearer, but they mostly just held their distance. They have no intention of acting on their reputation...........being killing machines. I wish that more people could understand this about sharks. Long before Hollywood and Jaws, sharks got a bad rap. I'm not saying that there are not times that they do strike a human, but it is mostly NOT intentional. The silhouette of a surfer on a board or the splashing in shallow water that mimics a wounded fish, are just some of the reasons a shark may strike.

But anyway, this is about my wonderfully, emotional dives with the sharks. It never fails that I get tears in my eyes at the sight of them. They are one of the most beautiful creatures in the ocean.

Since I am back on dry land, all I have left are the memories and my photos.I hope you enjoy them.

Shark !!!

Sharks have been around for 400 million years. This is about 200 million years before dinosaurs made the scene.

Long before Peter Benchley's "Jaws" book and Steven Spielbergs film adaptation, people have had a fear of sharks. I can see why the fear is there............stories have been cultivated for hundreds of years about "man-eating" sharks. Yes, sharks can be dangerous and yes, they do kill, but they are NOT the man-eating killing machines that they have been made out to be. The oceans are theirs and any killing they do is for their own survival. Any attacks that are on humans are merely by mistaken identity or that they were feeling threatened.

When I dive with sharks, I see nothing but a beautiful, graceful animal. I am working on a series of small paintings dedicated to the sharks I have dove with. I hope that through these paintings, you can overlook your fears and see the beauty that I see through my diving mask.

Gray Reef Shark, 12"x12" Oil painting, $140.00. To purchase, email me at dvrbon@wi.rr.com

http://www.bonnielynnsart.com

My World Underwater.....a poem

This is a poem I had written a few years ago about my diving.

My World Underwater

As I drift weightlessly through the coral heads, my mind clears
Itself of the worries of my world.


Peace and quiet at last...with no sound to hear but my
Own breathing. My eyes are filled with all the rainbow colors
The ocean offers.


The prism of colors of the fish shine as they dart back and forth in as
Much wonder of me as I am of them.


Brilliant blue sea stars clings to coral.
Small puffs of sand rise in the water around a spotted moral eel poking
His head out of a crevice in the rocks to watch me as I pass by.


A Southern stingray floats gently like a hovering flying saucer along the
ocean

bottom.

Barely disturbing the sand with his fluttering wings as he looks for his
next meal.


The long, silent shadow of a Caribbean reef shark can be seen eerily in
the

distance

Slowly, methodically his tail sways through the water.


These are the pleasures my world underwater bring me
These are the memories I take home.







Bonnielynn Brankey (copyrighted 1997).

Diving in the Bahamas

Water and being around it has always held a fascination for me since I was a child, but at the age of forty, what started out as something to do with my sons on a vacation to Grand Cayman, has now become a passion to me.

The sport of scuba diving has taken over my life, so to speak. No longer subscribing to Country Living and Good Housekeeping, Scuba Diver and Diver Alert magazines now fill my mailbox. I ask for new diving and underwater photography equipment for birthdays and Christmas. I dream of my next destination for a dive trip, and am packed weeks in advance. On a dive trip, my underwater camera is always loaded with fresh film and new batteries in readiness for that "perfect" photo. I don't care if I am diving in the warm waters of the Caribbean Sea, the turbid Pacific Ocean or the forty degree lakes and quarries of my native state of Wisconsin. Just so I am diving !!!

On getting certified, I met on my first Bahamian trip, three other women divers. We have since become best of friends and have been dubbed by the other divers in our circle, the "Viking Women", for the mere fact that the four of us out dive everyone else on our trips, including the men. On a four day trip, it is not uncommon for us to get in 18 dives.

On this first Bahamian trip, the "Viking Women" chose the island of Providence, (its capital being Nassau). The resort is called Dive,Dive,Dive and is on a remote side of the island, away from the bright lights of the city. We have since returned there to dive because of the beautiful reefs on what is called the Tongue of the Ocean.....a crevice that reaches out into the Atlantic Ocean and drops to 6000 feet. But what really draws us there is the incredible shark diving.
For whatever reason, the population of sharks is more abundant: Gray Reef, Caribbean Reef, Bull, Silky and an occasional Hammerhead. Despite what Hollywood has instilled into our psychics, sharks do not as a general rule attack people and use them as lunch. Sharks can be an aggressive animal, but if one is careful and does nothing to threaten them or their territory, then observing them can be a very pleasant experience. Their long streamlined silvery-gray bodies glide through the water in silence, and their elliptical unstaring eyes penetrate your very soul as they pass by you.

Diving on a shipwreck, such as the Bahama Mama with the sharks, makes for an unforgettable dive. The wreck looms up out of the abyss like a ghostly figure, and the silhouetted sharks add to the eeriness of the scene. Some of the shipwrecks in these waters are sunken cargo ships, rum-runners and Haitian escapee boats. Pirating is still alive and well in the Caribbean.