On our recent trip to Great Blasket Island we arranged a private hire, to ensure an early arrival on the island. As our boat approached the Island we noticed seabirds, in great numbers, diving into the sea, a shoal of fish no doubt. As my friends watched this I just happened to look over board, only to see the largest Basking Shark I have ever seen, quietly gild by our boat. Well, it was actually longer than our boat! I lent over to touch its dorsal fin only to jump back as my friend to my left shouted ' look at that!' The sea birds had been joined by a pod of dolphins, which were jumping right out of the water and generally feasting on the unlucky shoal . If the fish were not already taking an enough of a pasting, we watched on as, what we were told were, minkie whales arriving to finish off the hapless fish.

Now that is not an everyday scene, at least not one you are going to run into driving to work of a morning. As we pondered this and the fact no one managed to get any shots we arrived in the bay, where we were to transfer to a smaller boat so we could land at the slipway.

It wasn't the fact the beach appeared to be covered in seals, that held our eyes, but it was the shear amount of Basking sharks there was in this bay. So many in fact, that negotiating our small landing rib round them took some effort. I stopped counting at 25, and that was just the ones nearest to us. And I can confirm, when your in a small landing rib, with a shark thats more than twice the length of your boat swimming beside you. it is hard not to think of the film Jaws, and to remember these type of sharks only eat - or should that be filter? - plankton! Linkback: https://mountainviews.ie/summit/963/comment/6503/