Shark Bait in Destin Florida

Tuesday, October 09, 2007
2:30 am I awaken. An unusual event. The entire trip I typically wake up around 5 am but fall asleep again quickly and wake up with the rest of the family around 7 am or so. Not today. I tossed and turned for an hour before finally deciding that enough is enough. If I was up, I might as well do something. So I unhooked the RV and got on the road at 4 am (leaving New Orleans). I had only done this once before and I think it was more like 6 am. Waking up early turned out to be really beneficial because we were able to arrive at Destin, Florida by 10 am. Casting aside some problems finding an RV place (really the first time that has happened), we were at the beach by 12:30 pm. Destin beach is beautiful and the water is clear and of an aqua blue color. I’d almost say it is the perfect beach….except for the sharks. As we arrived onto the beach today folks promptly told us to be very cautious as 9 sharks had been sighted. After talking to some locals I discovered that bull sharks have been pretty aggressive in the last several years in the fall months. I watched the water like a hawk as the kids played around me for 3 hours. We didn’t enter the water more than 15 feet from the shore and I could see the bottom the entire time. After 2-3 hours of fun, I decided to leave and take Seth, Brandon, and Bailey to the pool and Sheri and Levi decided to stay back and play in the ocean some more. I had told Levi before leaving that I kind of wanted to see a shark from a distance. Sheri and Levi were out in about knee depth water and a shark (about 6 feet long) swam within 10 feet of them in water about waist deep. Thankfully, he wasn’t hunting them, or they probably would have been struck. Within minutes (after all the folks around had exited the beach) another one came in the same location. I never would have thought sharks would have swam in such shallow water, but a local gentleman had told me they are frequently spotted in 3 feet of water. For that reason, today goes down in the Mayo family history as one of the most frightening day of Sheri’s and Levi’s lives. I’m not sure we will enter the water tomorrow, but sand castle building is in order…….Oh, I’ve got to update some mileage. We entered Louisiana at 12,425 on Sunday. Today we entered Mississippi at 12,700, Alabama at 12,775, and Florida at 12,839.