Well, what was this experience? Ummm, you guessed it-AWESOME!!! First of all, what are all of the cruise ship passengers thinking when disembarking? There was only ONE couple on the boat to do the shark excursion from one of the ships. The other family of four drove from the Miami area. There was at least 5,000 people in port that day. This excursion is simply PHENOMENAL!!!! I must mention, the father/son duo are super super nice, fun, thoughtful and kind!!!!
The wildlife? Ummm, AWESOME!!!! There’s some pretty rare stuff we saw: 1) a three foot long bonnet head shark, 2) a man-o-war, which if it touched you, could inflict a lot of pain, or far worse, 3) a couple stingrays, 4) a pod of Dolphins, 5) 11 lemon sharks up close and personal. The skipper put out fresh bait on a pole so the sharks could smell it in the water. Once a school of lemons tracked the scent, BAM came the attack!!! It was impressive to watch. Once the sharks cleaned off the fresh bait, the dad put on some frozen bait. Why? It is a lot harder to rip chunks of meat off. That’s when the REAL action occurred!!!! Those sharks took turns going ballistic, trying to rip the meat off. It was almost like seeing small JAWS attacks, it was soooo cool!!! They even resemble a small version of a Great White to a degree, although the GW’s are a lot thicker. The biggest one we saw was about a nine foot male. Pretty impressive. 6) We also saw some cool birds: pelicans, cormorants and a number of other species.
Suggestions:
1). The boat’s a catamaran, which of course is covered, meaning it’s pretty comfortable when warm. In the winter months I might bring a light jacket though. If there’s a cold front, better to be safe than sorry.
2). The bathroom on the boat is not what I would classify as the easiest to get to, so if you have some years behind you in particular, it might be best to use one before embarking.
3). Please don’t hesitate to bring your kids with you, the father and son are both great with them. They’ll have some really cool stories to tell their friends too.
4) I recommend bringing two lenses with you if you’re a DSLR camera photographer: a medium range telephoto lens (I use an L-70-200 mm) and a general purpose. I liked the medium lens at times to get rid of the rope the bait was attached to, but at times it was too close to be effective. The general purpose was great too because sometimes you could get a bit more of a body shot because the sharks would really shake their heads hard to tear the meat. I guess it depends on what you want. The captain and skipper do a great job getting you your JAWS photo’s that you might want.
5). Seasickness pills I didn’t need and I’m not sure you will either, unless you’re really sensitive to it. The day we went out in January, 2020 (about a month before COVID-19 lockdown), we were only in turbulent waters for about 15 minutes on the way back to the pier.
In conclusion, due to the super nice Captain and skipper-father/son duo, the incredible wildlife you may see, along with beautiful weather and scenery, I VERY highly recommend taking this adventure!!! I’ve been very fortunate to swim with manatees in Florida, the beautiful dusky dolphins in New Zealand (of which you can’t touch-they are wild), climbed mountains in the Andes, trekked in the mighty Himalayas, been up close to mighty active volcanoes blowing their top and seen some of the rarest animals on earth (polar bears, tigers, orangutans, penguins, platypus, tree kangaroos, gharials, etc...) and you know what? This excursion done with Key West Extreme Adventures does NOT take second place. Why? Because it is unique in its own right. I’ve never once seen different species of sharks or stingrays so up close before on the same excursion in such a short period of time. I didn’t even know what that funny looking thing was on the surface of the water that happened to be a dangerous man-o-war until our captain told us. Really really good stuff!!! Folks, please don’t make the same mistake so many other cruisers did when I was in port-be obsessed with shopping. Go on an excursion with this company and you’ll never forget it!!!! You’ll have plenty of time to go shopping afterward. I went shopping at an art fair and visited a bunch of shops afterward, as well as ate at a restaurant. In my opinion, anyone who loves wildlife should go on this AWESOME excursion!!! It’s such a rare treat to see sharks like this. There should’ve been 5,000 people lined up at the stall on the pier to get on this boat tour. If you do this tour, I promise you’ll be happy you did!
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