Our guide, Gils - lanky, dark-featured, serene - drifts meditatively, perking up only at the appearance of a school of small skipjack tuna. They feed at night, so we’re seeing them in a relatively passive state, although whenever I approach one for a photo, it bolts into the dreamy blue background. Experts estimate the local shark population in the hundreds. They come to feed on the buffet of species in the pass and have only grown in number since 2006, when the territorial government established a shark sanctuary here. As we drop past 50 feet, I see them, dozens of gray reef sharks gliding along a wall of coral, at once sleek, powerful, beautiful and (sure) a little unnerving. I came to these islands to dive and in hopes of finding remnants of the ancient Polynesian culture, a playful, kind, egalitarian ethos exquisitely captured in David Howarth’s book “ Tahiti: A Paradise Lost.” Bungalows stretch into the lagoon at the Kia Ora Resort in Rangiroa, French Polynesia, a destination known for scuba diving, snorkeling and relaxed island living. The best known of these, and the territory’s commercial and cultural center, is Tahiti. At our guide’s signal, we drop from the maelstrom into the blue calm.įakarava is one of five atolls in French Polynesia, a collectivity of 118 islands cast across the South Pacific Ocean like unconfirmed rumors. We are only a few hundred yards from shore, but the dock from where we departed is barely visible through the gale. Swells pitch the boat as the rain turns horizontal. I’m with two other divers and a guide in Tumakohua Pass, one of the two major breaks in this necklace of coral where the ocean feeds a 37-by-14-mile lagoon. I am sitting on the gunwale of a dive boat off the French Polynesian atoll of Fakarava about to back-roll into a tropical sea famous for its abundance of sharks. This rain - relentless, chilling, downright vengeful - wasn’t in the brochure. This article originally appeared in The Washington Post Hundreds of sharks frequent the pass, which also features excellent snorkeling. Tweet Sharks cruise in Tumakohua pass on the south end of the Fakarava atoll.
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