The Indigo Outback (cont.)

You Are Here:

Home >> Travel >> The Indigo Outback (cont.)

Today's Question
Where should I camp in Switzerland with my kids? answer

What's the best volcano to hike up in North America? answer

How can I plan a trip around riding the biggest, fastest roller coasters? answer

Online Favorites

Special Issues

Photo Galleries

Outside Magazine February 2002

Page:

The Indigo Outback (cont.)

THE NEXT MORNING we dally around our makeshift campsite, a stretch of searing-white sand ten feet from the water that we share with a few dozen palm-size crabs. We pay no mind to the rapidly dropping tide—a crucial mistake that turns our first morning paddle into a sunbaked trudge across the flats. When we finally reach the beach back on West Island, the temperature is in the nineties and we are dying for nothing more than a cold Pepsi. But that would be our second mistake. The sign on the door of the restaurant tells the story. Lunch: 12 to 1. We are late and thirsty.

Know Before You Go

What to Bring: The Gear to Get You There

Access and Resources

After tracking down drinking water and waiting for the tide to rise, Paul and I head back out across the bay, intent on reaching the east side before dark. But two windy hours later we are only halfway. It is then that we remember something Terry's daughter Emma, 21, had said back in the tourism office as we scanned an aerial photo of the lagoon.

"You don't want to paddle across those," she said, pointing to dark spots in the water. "Those are black holes. That's where they live."

They are tiger sharks, second in size and ferocity only to the great white, reaching a

Paddling across deep patches where the bottom drops away to nothingness is very unnerving.

length of 18 feet and weighing more than 2,000 pounds. At the time we laughed it off as superstition, but we later heard credible talk of at least one, possibly two, resident tigers that occasionally take refuge in these holes. Paddling across these freaky, deep patches of indigo, where the bottom drops abruptly away to reveal nothingness, is so unnerving that I soon stop looking down altogether. It is during one of these hole crossings that I hear a yell from Paul that freezes me on the spot. Looking in his direction, I see an enormous white fin, five times the size of the reef-shark fins we've been seeing all day, slicing swiftly through the water just beyond the bow of his boat. I've never felt so instantaneously terrified in my life. When the fin disappears, Paul suggests that I paddle up behind him so that we can present a much larger silhouette to anything looking up from below.

"Why do I have to paddle in back?" I ask.

"Because that's the half they bite off," he replies.

In retrospect, Paul and I both believe that we really saw the underside of a large manta ray. At least, that's what we're telling ourselves.

Page: