Swimming with dolphins has long been a goal of many daring backpackers. But one traveler got more than he bargained for when he dived with a pod of dolphins off the coast of New Zealand to check another adventure off his bucket list. Adam Walker of Nottingham was swimming with the dolphins when a six-foot great white shark emerged only a few feet away.
He was swimming the 16-mile Cook Strait swim challenge when he came upon the shark, with the cold-blooded beast swimming beneath him. ‘I happened to look down and spotted a shark a few meters beneath me,’ Adam explained on YouTube. ‘I tried not to worry because I wanted to swim over successfully.’
When the shark approached, Adam claims the dolphins created a protective ring around him, sheltering him from any possible attacks. He told the Marlborough Express, ‘I’d like to assume they were guarding me and leading me home.’ ‘This swim will be with me for the rest of my life.’
Dolphins protect themselves from shark attacks by banding together in pods, with the brave creatures frequently pestering and driving away the predator. It’s unclear whether the dolphins did so in defense of Adam, but they did see off the shark in any event.
‘I can’t tell whether the dolphins came as a pod to my help since they couldn’t communicate with me, but I can say that after a few minutes, the shark vanished and the dolphins stayed with me for another 50 minutes, which was an incredible experience,’ Adam added.
He said that a buddy urged him not to worry about sharks in the ocean so near to the beach, pushing him to attempt to cross the strait, according to The Sun.
Adam stated that he has encountered sharks while swimming on two earlier occasions, in Hawaii, and in Japan’s Tsugaru channel, and that the best technique when seeing a shark is not to panic.
