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Along with a handful of other neoprene-clad snorkellers, I was suiting up to seek out my own transformative underwater experience. Would I befriend and mourn the death of my own cephalopod BFF? Unlikely, but I was hoping for a glimpse of filmmaker Craig Foster’s underwater world. And I wasn’t disappointed.
Just metres from the beach an inquisitive Cape bream came to investigate the ungainly visitors to his ’hood. A few kicks of the fins further on, a Barehead goby lay camouflaged on the sandy bed, surrounded by a battlement of colourful sea urchins. Farther out, vast shoals of strepies shimmered in the sunlight filtering through the fronds of kelp.
Finning along the surface, huffing through my snorkel, I was certainly no Craig Foster — for that, sign up for the free-diving courses Hanli Prinsloo runs in these waters — but the experience was nothing short of hypnotising.
At one point, our small group was so mesmerised by the kelp forest it took a moment to notice the huge short-tailed stingray that floated along the seabed below. Sadly, the octopus stars of the show were shy, and an hour later we stumbled out of the water smiling, but without our own cephalopod tale to tell.
I was dipping my toe into Foster’s underwater world as part of the three-day marine adventure experience run by Tintswalo at Boulders, a luxury lodge that rests on the mountainside just above Boulders beach. As locations go, the lodge is hard to beat. It’s set high enough to ensure panoramic coastal views, yet close enough to let the braying of African penguins wake you gently in the morning.
The lodge offers six suites, each named for notable ships that have sailed these waters through history, but it’s the top-floor suites, with a private terrace and endless sea views, that are the best in the house. Down below, airy lounges and quiet patios offer more ocean vistas, and plenty of nooks for relaxing indoors.
But you’ll want to spend your days outside, and the marine adventure package offers plenty of time on, in and near the ocean.
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