The Quintessential Shipwreck
I hung out for a few days in Khao Lak and stayed in a roadside guesthouse called Highway Inn and that’s what I got, a simple room with a fan an Internet for 300 Baht/night and half the distance to Mars Bar where many ex-pats bounce through and others just fall in. We had a few not so quiet ones at Mars Bar for those from the Wicked Diving trip that hadn’t left yet and staff. In the process I joined up with the two Aussies and set up for a wreck dive to Boonsung Wreck, just off the coast of Khao Lak. It’s a 30 minute drive in an air-con van and a 45 minute long tail ride to get the site marked with buoys. We’re there for two dives. There were no other boats in sight and Tom, our guide thought it odd. We had the whole tin mining vessel to ourselves. Tom is guiding, the two Aussies from the live-a-board, myself and a forth, Liz a lovely lady who eleven months had a baby and she was getting back in the water. It turned out she is one of the two people that are spearheading the ‘Shark Guardian’, the wife of Brendon. She and her husband, Brendon are basically building a marine research resource on their own and gaining support and awareness through Media, word of mouth, dive shops and people in general with conservation, research and shark data collection to help determine species growth or decline on a global scale. Sharks are being killed at a record pace and if they go, other marine life species and coral growth will also change and the aquatic world, 2/3 of the earth’s surface goes out of balance leading to a domino effect through other species including human. www.sharkguardian.org.
Between fishing net by-catch and fishermen targeting sharks to cut off the fins to sell primarily to China for their ‘shark fin soup’ to the rich and at weddings. Research has shown that bigger fish eat small fish and it’s in big fish where most mercury is collected and concentrated, meaning that eating shark fin soup is actually very unhealthy if not down right TOXIC. So next time you are out at a Chinese wedding, don’t eat the soup. After the fins are cut off the sharks the fishermen usually let the carcass sink to the bottom because the carcass shark meat is cheap in comparison and not always worth the time and labor. Some sharks only last a few minutes, those that have to move to breath, and others can stay alive for some time before they too die on the sea floor not to reproduce, not to procreate and perpetuate the survival of such a species.
There wasn’t much current on either dive that is a good thing, not fighting a current usually equates to more bottom time. Some of the highlights were seeing honeycomb eels, groups of porcupine fish, and massive schools of other species. On this unstable wreck many corals grow in many colors, shapes and sizes. The whole wreck seems to have been turned into a nursery for many species before they head out into the blue. There were definitely some big fish shadows on the perimeter and every now and again the wall of yellow fish would flex with small fish avoiding a bigger one charging from beyond.
On our return Liz invited us to a public talk/presentation her husband was giving on ‘Shark Guardian’ and it’s activities at a guesthouse/restaurant filled with many dive guides and instructors in the Khao Lak area that knew about Shark Guardian and could make it. I counted 60 people at one point with more coming.
At the end Brendon explained about a trip to South Africa for the Sardine Run where many varieties of shark and other fish show up for the buffet. Tempting, that would mean I’d be at the south end of another continent and that sounds awesome but transforms my previously perceived perception of the future. I’ll let you know later.
Maybe.
www.davidcdagley.com
