Growing Up with the Sea - Nantucket and New England Coast
Peter and Wendy ready for diving in Stonington, CT, where she spent all her summers growing up.
Wendy and Peter’s favorite type of close up shot – après diving.
Beach walk in Nantucket, where Peter spent his summers fishing, diving, and first experiencing the sight of dorsal fins cutting the New England sea.
The proud all-American sea-dog.
Peter sneers at the camera, while Wendy looks ready for more diving fun.
Peter out on the beach in Nantucket.
Peter and Wendy shared their love of the sea and New England with their children.
Big smiles on a family sailing excursion down the New England Coast.
Bermuda - Diving with Teddy Tucker
Peter with his mentor, Teddy Tucker, a walking encyclopedia and one of the great autodidacts in the history of science – a self taught expert on ships, coins, nautical history, underwater archaeology, painting and glassware.
Teddy in his natural element – studying and identifying historic shipwrecks. – was the inspiration for The Deep. Peter’s fictional character Romer Treece is Teddy Tucker.
Peter exploring part of Bermuda’s stormy history – part of a sunken 16th Century shipwreck.
Peter on his first diving trip in 1970 to Bermuda when the national Geographic sent him down to tell the story of Bermuda by the shipwrecks around it.
Wendy Benchley on board with captain Teddy – onboard Tucker’s boat, Miss Wendy, which was named after his daughter of the same name.
Peter and Wendy together exploring an historic shipwreck that Teddy has led them to.
The Vixen - one of more than 100 shipwrecks that Teddy Tucker has found – victims of Bermuda's vexing coral labyrinths.
South Western Australia- First Dive with Great Whites
Dangerous Reef, Neptune Islands, South Australia, 1974 - ABC American Sportsman challenged Peter to go diving for the first time with real great white sharks. He couldn’t say no.
ABC Sportsman’s boat and crew – Peter’s first memories were that he was “blinded by blood and nauseated by the taste of fish guts, whale oil, and putrid horse flesh.”
Peter with Rodney Fox, a miracle survivor after being attacked by a great white shark and badly bitten around his chest and arm at the age of 23, was the guide for this dive trip.
Stan Waterman, lead underwater photographer for this trip was well known and highly experienced for his classic shark movie Blue Water, White Death
Wendy reading on the ships hull – in those days women were not overtly welcomed to join the divers, but she would be the only one to see the shark cage rope caught in the sharks mouth.
Peter and the ABC Sportsman team preparing for a dive in the shark cages
Peter going down into the icy waters near the end of the Earth.
Peter could see rows and rows of spare teeth buried in the gum tissue, each tooth a holstered weapon waiting to be summoned forward to replace a tooth lost in battle.”
The shark circles the cage – and sensing alarm or entrapment, it suddenly seemed to panic and started violently shaking the rope and with it Peter inside the cage.
While all this was going on, the crew and cameramen were transfixed, so Wendy was the only one to see that the rope was caught; she rushed down to pull it free.
Below the surface the length of rope drifted into the sharks gaping mouth and got caught between its teeth; that rope was Peter’s lifeline.
Peter emerges from the experience shaken AND exhilarated by the beauty of the powerful creature that was just inches away from possibly killing him
The excitement is over, the great white is gone, and the shoot is wrapped. Finally, Wendy gets a chance to check out the shark cage.
Pictured here Peter is headed down and later described the experience as “bobbing alone in a flimsy cage in the frigid sea, tumbled about like dice in a cup.”
Sea of Cortez - Splendor of Riding a Manta
From Girl From the Sea of Cortez “The manta tilted its wing and arched its back, changing its angle to display a belly of sheer and shiny white. Five trembling gills were on either side, crescent wings like slices of the winter moon.
One of the most spectacular underwater experiences I have ever had – riding the great manta ray and it was the inspiration for Peter’s novel, Girl From the Sea of Cortez
Stan Waterman’s son, Gordy, seen here also getting the ride of a lifetime
From Girl From the Sea of Cortez - “The bizarre T-shaped head swings slowly from side to side…At first there was only one, rolling and bucking with the grace and precision of a carousel horse.”
From Girl From the Sea of Cortez – “And then, from the darkness came the sharks – hammerheads: silent searchers moving with a relentless arrogance that broadcast their sovereignty over the seamount.”
From Girl From the Sea of Cortez - “At the top of its arc it hung for a fraction of a second, titans of shimmering black against the sun that rimmed it with a halo of gold.”
Tahiti, French Polynesia - Diving with the Queen of the Pacific
Peter and Wendy sailing with Christopher Benchley around Tahiti, which was formed from volcanic activity and is high and mountainous with surrounding coral reefs
Peter and Christopher exploring the beaches of Tahiti which is referred to as the “Queen of the Pacific”
Wendy takes Christopher on his first diving adventure using a hookah.
Part of the magical experience of Tahiti was hoping to see the dolphins. Three magnificent beauties - all jumping in synchronized formation. Pure joy.
The whole French Polynesian gang!
Peter and Christopher diving
A spectacular Tahitian sea turtle is spotted
Producing An Ocean Conservation Film Series with Greg Stone for the New England Aquarium
Peter and Greg Stone were introduced to each other in the early 1970’s by Teddy Tucker, who was a mentor to both. Pictured here inside his boat, Miss Wendy.
With partners Fidelity and PEW, Greg convinced Peter to be the host of a new kind of ocean conservation series that would reach thousands of enthusiastic visitors to NE Aquarium.
Peter diving in Bermuda during the video series production.
The video series they created addresses both the wonders and the major threats facing our seas – from giant pelagic fish and exotic deep sea creatures to over fishing, climate change, and destruction of coral reefs.
South Australia - Postmortem of a Great White
Barry Bruce, a leading shark experts invited me to join him for a look inside the cavity of this great white female.
Nature in its infinite and eternally astonishing wisdom, determined that an apex predator as powerful as a great white should not exist in vast numbers. Studying them like this is vital to our knowledge about them.
Scientists now suggest that the maximum total length of this species is about 680 cm (22.3 ft). Males mature at about 350 cm (10.5 ft) and females at about 450 cm (14 ft).