(This post is part of BootsnAll’s 30 Days of Indie Travel series. All are welcome to join.)

On a blogging trip in Australia, which I vowed to do every single activity that was presented to me, I came face to face with what was one of my biggest fears: SHARKS.

I don’t know at what point in my life this fear started. I loved the water as a child, but at some point I just started to become nervous about what was going on below. It was something that stalled my learning to scuba dive, even though my dad would go on and on about how amazing it is.

I took on my fear of sharks little by little, but always on my travels. 

It started in Croatia where I earned my open water and advanced open water on Korcula in 2007. There I realized how unlikely it is to actually see a shark. My instructor laughed when I told her sharks were the only thing that bothered me about diving. She basically said, “You should be so lucky as to see a shark when only just learning to dive.”

Diving definitely helped me with the fear, but I still got nervous every time I entered the water. I had to get over those nerves when I went on a live aboard in Belize where the only thing you do for five days straight is dive. I saw one shark in my 25 dives and it was a dog shark. From that experience I learned that some sharks are more afraid of me than I was of them.

All these baby steps brought me to the edge in Mooloolaba, Australia. The blogging trip I was on set up a shark dive for me and my fellow blogger at Underwater World. I vowed to take advantage of every opportunity presented on that trip, so without hesitation, agreed to jump in the aquarium tank.

Not moving my arms during my Shark Encounter at Underwater World in Mooloolaba, Australia. Photo courtesy of Underwater World

It wasn’t much of a dive. More like a walk surrounded by sharks. I started balling my eyes out as we were given instructions on how to enter and what not to do while in the tank. The divemaster told us to keep our arms crossed on our chests, because the sharks were hand-fed so if we were to wave our arms around the fish might assume it was food.

I was shaking the entire dive and my mask actually filled up with water from my tears, but that discomfort would have to remain cause I wasn’t moving my arms even the slightest bit.

The tank was filled with an array of sharks. It held a few grey nurse sharks, which I found out are a lot nicer than they look. I was worried most about bull sharks, which can be aggressive, but they only kept small ones in the tank.

At the end of the dive, our guide presented us with a shark tooth to feel while we were still in the water. Everyone touched it, but I just shook my head no. He said keep our arms tightly locked against our bodies and that’s exactly what I did.

I felt I had faced my fear that day, but now it was time to conquer it.

So what did I do?

I moved to an island known for its shark sightings and spent 5-weeks diving there. I saw a lot of thresher sharks while earning my divemaster on Malapascua in the Philippines. At first, I was nervous about them, but after a few dives with no sighting, I started wanting to see them. Once I actually kneeled as a thresher shark glided by me less than a foot away. It was one of the most thrilling moments of all my travels.

I know a lot of people fear sharks, some even hate them, but they are really beautiful creatures that should be treasured. It took me a while to learn that.