Diver swims with a whale shark

Cocooned in rural seclusion, placid little Donsol town long kept a big but unintended secret: in the first half of the year, the sea swarms with the world's largest fish.

Whale sharks - some as big as a bus - put on an annual show for local folks for generations, roaming close to shore and seemingly unafraid of humans.

Then in 1997, a group of visitors got wind of the creatures, known locally as "butanding." The visitors were enthralled by the sharks' gentleness, swimming like gigantic dolphins. Word got round, helped by the Internet, and before long tourists began descending on laid-back Donsol, tucked amid coconut groves and hills away from the main road in Sorsogon province, about 580 kilometers south-east of Manila.

"The whale sharks brought us to the limelight," says Donsol mayor Salve Ocaya. “We're trying to cope with the arrival of so many visitors, many of them from as far as Europe.” “But we don't have enough resorts," Ocaya said, according to a report published in the Philippines.

"And have you seen our bridge?" he adds, referring to a long, narrow span that can handle only one car at a time crossing a mangrove-lined river to the village of Dancalan, the staging area for boat trips to watch the whale sharks.

Donsol is among the latest to organize in-water viewing of the big fish - a sometimes nerve-racking attraction offered in a few places like Australia's Ningaloo Reef, Belize in the Caribbean, Mexico and the Seychelles.

Whale sharks, which can grow as long as 18 meters and weigh up to 34 tonnes are an eye-popping sight up close. But they don't eat meat, surviving by sucking seawater into their gaping mouths and sieving plankton and tiny crustaceans on their gill rakers.

Little is known about the nature of whale sharks, which roam warm tropical seas. They congregate in Donsol's murky waters from January to June, probably because of the abundance of plankton, says the local branch of the conservation group World Wildlife Fund.

For the Philippines, which is struggling to lure foreign tourists amid law-and-order problems, Donsol has become a surprise draw. Just 900 tourists visited the town in 1998, the year after word of the sharks got out. Last year saw 7,600 visitors - a third of them foreigners, calculates Donsol's tourism officer, Salvador Adrao Jr.

On a recent day, SUVs rumbled down a muddy hillside road in palm-lined Dancalan and disgorged dozens of tourists at the small, government-run visitor center, which collects boat rental and guide fees and arranges day-long expeditions. Villagers rented snorkels and rubber fins and peddle souvenirs. Police armed with M-16 rifles watched over the early morning bustle.

A motorboat set out with five tourists laden with life vests, snorkels, dive masks and fins, a whale shark spotter perched atop a pole, shading his eyes from the sun. After about an hour, he yelled, "There! There!" pointing to what looked like a small, grey submarine just under the waves.

The boat erupted in sudden commotion as the boat maneuvered close to the whale shark. Carlos Pendor, a stocky, sunburned guide, cajoled two jittery tourists to jump off the boat. He dragged them to the side, yelling "Look down!" A seven-meter whale shark, its grey-green back dotted with faint lines and pale-white spots, swam tranquilly by, its flat head and body gently swaying.

At close range, the whale shark was so huge it was hard to see in its entirety. But by the time the tourists grabbed a breath of air, it was gone.

Twenty-three other boats bobbed in the waters off Donsol that morning. Most sputtered back to shore by lunch, each encountering 5 to 10 whale sharks on the way.

"It was sort of scary because out of nowhere came this huge, square face," recalled Eliot Bikales, a housewife from Hamden, Connecticut. "It was like Jaws," her 10-year-old daughter, Maral, butted in. But she said that after her fears eased. "It was okay. It felt like they were my friends."

Sid Lucero, a young Filipino actor, said facing such a huge creature nearly moved him to tears. "It hit me straight in the heart," he said. "Looking at this huge creature reminded me that there is a higher being."

Thanks to the new tourism, the sharks have created about 1,000 seasonal jobs in Donsol, a poor farming and fishing town of about 40,000 people once said to have been a communist rebel stronghold.

On what used to be a barren beach stand five small inns. But their 50 rooms are inadequate for the hundreds of tourists who flock in the peak months of March and April, prompting plans for construction of a hotel, along with a concrete road to Dancalan. There is even talk of a small airport.

Donsol, however, is wary about damaging the pristine conditions that lure the sharks. Projects like a pier have been junked. Only 25 dive boats - down from nearly 50 - are now allowed at sea at one time, the mayor said.

The town is also waging war against poachers, helped by the World Wildlife Fund and USAID. Poachers hunt the sharks for lucrative Asian markets like Taiwan, where there is a strong demand for pricey shark fin soup.

Although Donsol has been designated a sanctuary, whale sharks face danger when they slip beyond its waters. Villagers say they have seen sharks with spear wounds and slashed fins or tails.

Dancalan's seaside visitor center has become a conservation outpost. "The whale shark has only one natural enemy - your appetite for shark fin soup," a sign says. Tourists are required to watch a video about whale shark protection before going out to sea.

The whale sharks, however, seem to be their own best ambassadors. Many visitors return to shore transformed into advocates. "They are national treasures that need to be protected," said Bikales, the Connecticut housewife.