Like someone said earlier the more you see the less worried you become.
I probably see one the majority of times I give kite lessons (I think it's the same one that I see the most about 3m tiger) and he has only paid attention to the students body dragging twice and that was just a quick second look. The rest of the times he just keeps on swimming. Those that have run over him on boards have scared him straight off.
Select to expand quoteyeah I am with you on that one.40 something years of surfing I think I could count the amount of sharks Ive seen on one hand.
Yeah , but what happened to you're other hand?
We see them from time to time off the Gold Coast.
I saw what I thought was a turtle in the Alley one day in sub planing conditions and slogged over to check it out. Turned out to be 2m shark head on. The moment we both saw each other it bolted and I tried to stay upright. Got the heart going.
Always had this curiosity about what would happen if you fell into one of the shark nets out the back. Had an image of a fly stuck in a spiders web.
I heard the Alley is full of Bull Sharks but they are mainly after Sups. They are attracted to the paddle movement thinking it is a wounded baby whale separated from its gopro..
How come whenever I kayak and want to see one I don't..grr 
I feel much safer in a kayak.
Select to expand quoterustle said...yeah I am with you on that one.40 something years of surfing I think I could count the amount of sharks Ive seen on one hand.
Yeah , but what happened to you're other hand?
Had a 3 foot skark do a super spinner 50m in front of me fanging along at 11 oclock on me port side sailing out the back of sunset beach park reef break .....i was approx 500m out ..... it did a boost 1m with some hang time. 
Was suppen St Georges Beach park with clean water and sweet glassy 2 to 3 foot sets with a light offshore NEasterlies at 2 - 5 Knots in the middle of winter .
man it was sweet bring on some winter swells.
Oh yer back to the story
I looked up to see a fin at least 1 half feet playing on the surface ,,,,,no flipper stories here man.
This was long and skinniee you know the difference between a slalom ,race board, wave board , side fin thrusters, twin fins, quadie FINS..... well do you punk.
This was a slalom race looken fin it got me finken what the fk was that.
I felt safe on the sup as i would shove the paddle down the throat of any beast
I was not far away from where it surfaced and hang... say 10m and it was comming to me or i was going to it ,so i drifted on over towards where it was.
Well fk me this shadow way wider than my paddle board drifted 2 feet under me with the side fin i had seen .....
**** did i stiffen up
Then just as i was expecting to see it 20 feet long and go into total panik mode
The bottom reappeared
So what was it 
Big SUN FISH with 2m diamiter or 1m radius take your pick with 2 x 28 inch slalom styled race fins on either side.
I LET IT LIVE and did not bash it with my paddle as it did not attack
In nearly 20 years 2 tigers off Wello south side, 1 hammerhead at Lanno and ran into one at Scarbs, sailed over 1 BIG GW and seen a few fins at Scarbs (always heading south around November).
The only scary one was at Surfers on a light day wavesailing. I was grovelling out and a large Tiger sat 4ft away on the other side of the board and just followed me out. He was on the surface, could see the stripes, gills and eye and looked curious. After about 80 metres of grovelling he slowly descended but didn't turn away, speedup or slow down, it made me even more nervous knowing he was still there but now couldn't see him and the wind had almost stopped and was sinking so had no choice but to start pumping. Figured if I couldn't be quiet I'd be noisy and started yelling as well and hoped he turned away.
I knew there wasn't enough wind to turn and of course fell in but got back out so quick I don't think I even got wet. By this time my legs had turned to jelly and it was a struggle just to hold my own weight little lone pump the sail but got back in and collapsed on the beach, could not physically stand
, defiantly made my top 5, or 6. No other shark has given a fear factor, really felt like prey being stalked with nowhere to run.
Could have been worse though, heard those bee's can bee pretty nasty
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, defiantly made my top 5, or 6. No other shark has given a fear factor, really felt like prey being stalked with nowhere to run. . Gotta love that being stalked feeling. I was only followed for 10 meters by a 2.5 meter whaler, then it simply got bored. He was probably satisfied my heart rate was dangerously high and legs were shaking enough- sadistic bastards!
SUP'ing yesterday morning at Burrum with Vando and a good size hammerhead surfaced 2 meters in front of me chasing fish, i turned and paddled for the beach, interestingly the same direction the fish had decided to go so we were moving parallel. The hammer then turned toward me and back out, came within a meter.
Not sure of actually size but the distance between dorsal fin and tail would have been about 2 metres, maybe a little more. Dorsal was surpassingly tall! maybe its like how hold-up victims describe the size of gun barrels haha
It certainly got my heart going!
It looks like the sharks have finally realised that eating people is only damaging their reputation and have finally decided to something about it.
(Tincy bits of Potty language at the start but nothing serious)
Seen a few but nothing bigger than about 2.5mtrs, However, last year while wsurfing Mandurah in the ocean, I was being buzzed by a light plane overhead, thinking he's a bit close, WTF's he doin, just kept circling around????........ any way finished my sail, and later that night on the news they said a 5m White Pointer was spotted by the Shark Patrol Plane in Mandurah DOH!!!!!!!!!
Check this sucker out phil !!!!!!!!!! mate sent me this bout 4yrs ago.His story (may not be factual) was that this guy was sitting out off a beach near Foster NSW.His mate was piloting an ultralight and took this shot of his mate.It wasnt till he got home and uploaded th shot to find Mr Chompy cruising just behind the break.Fact or fiction,thats one big ass shark!!!
That was in a Tracks surfmag i have about 3-4 yrs old.
The photo is photoshopped but is of the same beach.
I think the shark photo is the same day as the surf Photog 'Shorty' was attacked by a 12ft Whitey.
Why Sharks Circle You Before Attacking...
Two great white sharks swimming in the ocean spied survivors of a sunken ship.
"Follow me son" the father shark said to the son shark and they swam to the mass of people.
"First we swim around them a few times with just the tip of our fins showing."
And they did.
"Well done, son! Now we swim around them a few times with all of our fins showing."
And they did.
"Now we eat everybody." And they did.
When they were both gorged, the son asked, "Dad, why didn't we just eat them all at first?
Why did we swim around and around them?"
His wise father replied, "Because they taste better without the **** inside!"
Fake shark photo:
www.smh.com.au/national/the-picture-that-scared-off-a-1000-tourists-and-it-was-a-fake-20071104-gdriex.html
I have seen a few at Trial Bay swimming around (school sharks I think), a fair number at Crowdy(mostly schoolies, and one Bronze Whaler which was curious and tagged behind me for about 10 minutes) and had a bull shark jump out of the water at me missing me by a few inches at Crowdy as well. Have seen some in the waves off the Bommie at Saltwater Point also over the years, but not sure what type.
Why would anyone red thumb the post by Sheartip???
A factual article and the sort of thing that has been going on in the surf for years, FFS!!!!!!!!!!
Truth over bull****, get over it.
A few weeks ago three of us were SUP sailing off Ocean Beach Umina about 500 metres off the beach, when one of the boys comes over and says "Did you guys see the dolphin out there about 100 metres past the break?"
I said "No."
Did not think about it and kept catching the small waves. A few minutes later he comes back over to us and says "It's not a dolphin, it's a shark about 8' long and a brownish colour." So we all decide we better go in as it was obviously chasing large bait fish we could see just out past the breaking waves.
Wait about 20 minutes for it to get its feed and then we decide to go back out for more waves, I get about 20 metres from the break and guess what? It's still bloody there!!!
Could not identify it except that it was brownish. Local fishos later told us there were plenty of sharks out there just that we hardly ever saw any during daylight hours.
Hopefully when we are out they are not feeling hungry - that's what I am hoping anyway.
"had a bull shark jump out of the water at me missing me by a few inches"
Interesting you mention jumping sharks. I was fishing in the river yesterday arvo and seen one around 80 kilos go airborn close by. This happens alot up this way, and I'm sure they (and a few other species) jump and land like a sack of spuds to scratch themselves. Marlin and sailfish do it a lot around here too. I believe small parasites cause them to itch, and going airborn and landing hard must provide some relief. I have bass in a fish tank and whilst they don't jump they regularly scratch themselves by scraping along the gravel bottom or rubbing on the log in the tank.
Ok, way off track, back to more horror shark stories!
I had one directly under me which I initially thought was the shadow of my board, it was keeping up with me but looked like it was trying to get away from me - as I was him. I was fully powered up in 23 knots - and it then accelerated away and to the left, which was pretty impressive, very quick!
