Ilot Kouare is a small uninhabited islet in the World Heritage Site of New Caledonia's Lagoon, about 40 nautical miles southeast of Noumea. A maze of vibrant coral reefs surround the islet and here, in the summer, thousands of species of fish and invertebrates assemble to breed in the clear protected waters.

A few pleasure boats from Noumea venture this far into the southern lagoon during weekends and holidays. Kouare has a reasonably good lagoon anchorage with plenty of open sand areas in 6 to 7 metres of water to anchor in.

The fringing reef is lush with brilliantly colored corals from awash at low tide to 6 meters of water. Snorkelling along the reef is an absolute delight with sea turtles, shoals of sardines, tropical fish of every description, brilliant sea fans and even a small white tip reef shark Triaenodon obesus that glided by as I was taking this underwater panorama of the coral reef. It swam around the coral mound three times. The third time it vanished behind the coral I quickly finned over, dove down, and waited for it to come around for another pass. I wanted a nice close-up of it just coming over the reef, next to a plate coral. It had come exactly the same way each time.

I waited and waited, Freddy staying well back so as not to frighten it, until I could not hold my breath any longer. I surfaced and there was no shark in sight. "Where's the shark?" I called out to Freddy.

"It came up just on the other side of the coral head from you then somehow knew you were there."

"Which way did it go?" I asked swimming over to her.

"It stopped just before it came over the coral and then turned and swam off as fast as it could go - that way, along the reef. You really scared it."

I have no idea how it knew I was lying in wait. Perhaps the shark's lateral line motion sensors picked up some slight movement. Maybe it is just one of those things - like when you look at someone who is turned away from you and somehow they know - even at some distance - and turn around and look right into your eyes.

Since this part of the World Heritage Site management plan allows for fishing - even spear fishing - the critters are hyper sensitive and if you look directly at them or try to approach them they keep their distance. Which is just as well.