Brea really wanted to be able to say that she swam with sharks so doing the Diving with Sharks tour was a must for us. We found this tour group and booked our reservation online. One of the reasons we chose this one is because the sharks were not in cages. One Ocean is also a company that strives to learn about the sharks in a humane way. If you’re afraid of sharks and the water, we wouldn’t recommend doing this dive. It is safe though so don’t worry!
Contents
Hours
You have to book your activity and your timeslot online. It’ll look something like the below. We suggest picking something earlier in the day in case the water conditions get worse. At first, we picked a time in the afternoon but the tour guide suggested we come earlier (which was good for us).
Directions
Address: 66-105 Haleiwa Beach Road Haleiwa HI 96712 USA
Price
The Diving with Sharks tour (Shark Research Snorkel) costs $150 per person ($80 for ride-alongs). Similar to the dolphin swim, you can also purchase a photo/video package.
GoPro Package – $50
One of the safety divers will be filming your entire dive.
Professional Photography Package – $250
This package includes the GoPro pacakge above plus professional photography using a Canon DSLR. These prices are per group. Not per individual.
Parking
Their parking lot is pretty spacious so you have a lot of spots to choose from. Their instructions are to park near the little brown restroom building near the harbor entrance on the back side (west) of Haleiwa Joe’s Restaurant. We had a hard time finding this on the day we went (October 25, 2018) so we suggest arriving early. The kiosk is a blue kiosk so park closer to that or else you will be walking for awhile.
Restrooms
There are no restrooms on the boat so make sure to use the restrooms at the harbor before boarding.
Diving with Sharks
Getting There
If you were like us and are running late and also kind of lost, then make sure to save their contact information.
You can text them at this number: +1-808-649-0018 or email: oneoceandiving@gmail.com
You need to check in at the blue kiosk before going on the boat.
There are 3 types of boats. Ours was the Koa Kai.
Pono Kai
A 24 feet white dive boat with a blue canopy. It will say “ONE OCEAN DIVING” on the side in large block letters.
Koa Kai
A 27 feet white catamaran with “ONE OCEAN DIVING” on the side in blue block letters.
Mano Kai
A 30 feet silver vessel with a blue canopy and blue trim with “ONE OCEAN DIVING” on the side in large white block letters.
They will tell you which boat to board after you check-in.
Things to Bring
We were more prepared for this tour compared to the dolphin swim. Make sure you bring these items:
- Towels
- Sunglasses
- Sunscreen (they mention only biodegradable reef safe sunscreen and no aerosol spray sunscreen)
- Camera
- Water
- Extra clothes
- Snorkel equipment (they also have masks, snorkels, and fins to borrow)
- Seasickness medication
- Would highly recommend a weight belt for all female divers. You will have a hard time freediving down without assistance.
On the Boat
The whole tour will be approximately 2 hours. The boat ride to the dive location is only 15 minutes. During this 15 minutes, the safety divers will give you an educational briefing on shark biology, shark behavior, and safety guidelines. They also have a pamphlet that covers all the different types of sharks that you might encounter.
In the Water
You don’t need to have diving experience to be able to do this tour but you should have basic swimming abilities or you will feel extremely uncomfortable. Once you get to the dive location, you will have up to 90 minutes in the water.
Your group will go into the water one person at a time and they stress that you need to first hold on to the rope that runs along side the boat. Once everyone is in the water, they will take one or two people out further away from the boat. If you want to, you can also indicate to the safety divers that you want to dive down. They will countdown and then you will go. If you purchased the photo package, this is where you will get your nice pictures hopefully with sharks in the background!
You also can just stay on the rope if you want to (that’s what I did).
You will see a lot of sharks and the water is very clear and blue. But the waves that day were very rough.
This was a once in a lifetime experience and it was worth every penny. The only thing that Brea and I wish was different was that we were better swimmers and was able to dive down more to get better pictures. But there’s always next time!
Click here for other things to do during your trip to Hawaii.
