Come dive with me, let's dive, let's dive away!

Hello all!

It’s Saturday and we have been diving the past couple of days.  While on the one hand it is sad that the vacation is almost over, on the other hand, it has been a pretty good past couple of days.  I hope everyone has had a good Thanksgiving and Black Friday and whatever Saturday™.

On Friday, Stacy and I woke up at the ass crack of dawn to join Lahaina Divers in their trip to Molokai to see the Hammerheads.  To do this, you have to cross the Pailolo Channel which means crazy fisherman because you have to be crazy to fish out there.  It should be named Dramamine channel because without it, you are going to be sorry!  Seriously, the boat was a rollercoaster and if you were going up and heard the engines cut off, you better brace yourself because it was going to dive into a trough like a bucking bronco.  Lahaina divers kept saying “we are the only ones to do this dive” which has to be true because they are the only ones with a 46’ boat (I kept thinking “we’re going to need a bigger boat!”) and the only ones insane enough to do it. 

There was an older dude on our boat named Bob.  Bob has been diving longer than Jacques Cousteau (that’s the folklore, anyway).  Bob was diving with a rebreather which is a technical dive apparatus that basically lets him stay down for 3+ hours at a time and doesn’t give off bubbles.  The hammerheads are afraid of the bubbles to he goes down before any of the rest of us, grappling hooks himself into the floor (there is a TON of current) and then stays down during our 2 dives plus surface interval.  The reason I am telling you about Bob is: 1) the whole rebreather thing sounds pretty cool to do…initial training runs $1000!!!! And 2) I heard one of the DM’s ask the other why we were still trying to cross the channel with how bad it was and the other said “because Bob is on board”.  I am not trying to out the DMs, it’s just the conditions were the worst 20% you could have on that crossing and I got to experience it.  Or another way to look at it: if Bob hadn’t been there, we probably would have turned around and headed back to easier dives.  I wish I had a picture, but I was too busy holding on for dear life.  Let’s just say at many times did I look at the water thinking “that wall coming towards us is taller than the boat”.  We do some cray-cray stuff to go on dives…

We finally got there and got loaded up for the first dive.  The briefing had all these fairy tales about how we were going to be put in over here and then let the current take us over there and then happiness and joy would follow.  Well the current was stronger than I was thinking and I think we were dropped a little off where the briefing said we were, butwhatdoIknow.  All I do know is, we immediately saw a spotted eagle ray “swimming” standing still because the current was so strong.  We then passed over Bob fairly fast and then found ourselves near 3-4 hammerheads!!!!  Really we only got about 20 feet from them before they headed out for the hills.  Apparently they are more afraid of us than we are of them.  After that, the first dive was pretty tame…drifting along at 50 feet depth in ~120 feet of water.  Then out of nowhere a pelagic jelly fish came into view.  So cool looking.  Super happy I got photos.

 

No lasers on the heads of these bad boys

yeah...divers still in the way but whatareyougoingtodo

Boom!  Wait until they are out of the way.  There you go.  Hammer-freaking-head!

Pelagic Jelly (no alterations were done other than me setting white balance while diving)

a closer up view...how freaky is that thing?

Just for you, Julia...look in the background towards the right

Barracuda!! 

why they call it fish rain...

Bob down there with his rebreather on.  He was there for 3 hours!!

I thought we were kicking a lot but apparently not enough.  We came out of that first dive in super-duper rough water.  Remember those swells I was talking about in the channel crossing?  Well we came up in the middle of that kind of shit.  Hand’s down the craziest, scariest exit I have been a part of.  We were all on a line thrown from the boat and going one at a time handing our fins to one person and listening to the other telling us when to approach the boat trying to prepare for “big wave”.  Stacy lost her hold/footing and fell back into the water when she was half-way up the ladder.  It was bad enough that 4 of the 16 divers said “fuck that” on going in for the second dive.  I was queasy as a mo-fo for a while after getting out and had to stand and look at the horizon to calm the stomach.

Stacy and I did do the second dive and while we didn’t see the hammerheads again, we did see another eagle ray as well as why they call it “fish rain”.  There were so many fish there, it was like it was raining them.  This time, we kicked even more and made it to a more sheltered spot to get out.  The ironic part is the ride back, while still bucking bronco, wasn’t that bad after all the craziness leading up to it.

Last night we went out to a place called Monkeypod for dinner.  Awesome food but the reason I am bringing it up is they had Breakside Brewing’s IPA on tap!  Shout out to Portland brewing….and if I ever move to Maui, I know where one of my watering holes will be.

Today we went on a dive trip with Maui Dreams diving.  We hadn’t planned on doing a trip today, but a) we hadn’t seen a turtle on any of the dives b) they were going to Molokini crater where I had never been and c) they had space available.

Unfortunately the wind was blowing bad enough that NO one was going to Molokini, but we did do 2 dives off Maui proper: Stone Wall and (I think) Temple East.  Both good, relaxing dives where we not only saw turtles, we also saw octopi!!  The other group also saw a manta ray, but I didn’t so I can’t claim it.  We did see a monk seal on the ride back sitting up on a shelf sunning itself so that was pretty sweet too.

 

turtle!!

Whitemouth moray eel

trumpet fish

Octopus

More octopus

"scarmbled egg" nudibranch

realized I wasn't taking enough "look at all those fish!" photos...so here you go

Another turtle swimming away

'Nother moray (but super in focus...click to embiggen)

A school of moorish idol fish...tons of 'em

Thornback cowfish.  Super cool

Another scrambled egg nudi.  The yellow bits are it's gills (I think)

Bit of an octopus hiding in some coral

puffer fish (unpuffed, of ourse)

Turtle swimming away

The thing that looks like a leaf blowing in the wind (and moving fast so it was hard to keep it in frame) is a dragon wrasse which is a juvenile rockmover wrasse and looks nothing like it's end form.  Hopefully the compression doesn't totally pixelate this

Now we are getting ready to head out for the last dinner in Hawaii before going back to the real world. 

Hope all are happy and well!!

Remember: It’s our time, the people’s time!

Love you guys

Jim

 

Rock Chalk Maui Invitational

Happy Thanksgiving everyone and it’s time for a mid-Maui update.  The condo we were in was pretty sweet but sadly, Tam and Sophia flew home today so Stacy and I switched to another condo near Kihei.  To say goodbye, however, the original condo gave us a nice rainbow.

 

So long and thanks for all the fish!

After getting in late Saturday, we spent Sunday checking out Whaler’s Village (where all the teams were staying as well as shopping).  We had lunch at Joey’s Kitchen which was super highly rated.  Turns out it was in the food court!  But those reviews were right on.  My Ono tacos were awesome and their Brussel sprouts were incredible.  We then wandered down to the beach to see if we could find any super tall dudes (aka basketball players).  We did see some Wake Forest guys, but no KU.  At the Sheridan, Tam just got done telling us that he really wanted to see Danny Manning when we turned a corner and saw Danny Manning sitting on a bike right next to Bill Walton.  Actually, to give credit where it is due, Stacy kept saying “is that him?” for every tall black dude we passed and she finally was correct.  Tam squeaked out “hi” and Danny said it back so Tam’s day was made.

Pretty funny, we saw them going up and down this lightly traveled road in front of the hotel and it was pretty obvious they were filming Walton doing an interview of Danny.  Tam the stalker got some good shots of them.

We went down to the Weston where KU was staying and saw there would be a pep rally the next day at 1:30 before the first game.  We decided we needed to attend.  I rock chalked a grubby looking guy wearing a KU shirt and Tam happily informed me I just Rock Chalked Greg Gurley.  All I can say is: he is bigger now than he was when he was playing.  Nice guy tho.

The next stop on Sunday was at the Lahaina Civic Center where the games were going to be played.  We wanted to verify it was sold out (it was) and also determine if there was any way we could get tickets.  I had read about a van in the parking lot where local “ticket brokers” would sell you tickets so we were trying to scope that out.  Well now I am probably letting the old cat of the bag but they actually do standing room only tickets for each game.  They cost the same as GA tickets and you are NOT guaranteed a seat but the security company dude we talked to said they do try to find everyone a seat because they don’t want you clogging the aisles.  I searched all over the internets before coming here trying to find some way to get tickets outside the packages and never heard a peep about SRO but talking to people in line, they have been around for a while.

They hand out tickets at 5:45 AM with numbers on them to set your place in line for the SRO sales that happen at 8.  Sucks to get up that early, but that is how we got tickets to the first and second games (getting up at the ass crack of dawn and waiting in line).  For the championship game, after Indiana lost, they opened up GA ticket sales for that finals game.  My only guess is: based off the fan sales for the remaining (non-IU) teams they determined how many GA tickets they could sell to fill up some seats.  We branch predicted before game 1 that they would make it to the finals and spent the money to get tickets rather than waiting.  That allowed us to sleep in on Wednesday rather than doing the SRO thing.

 

SRO bracelet for game 2 (click to embiggen...if you want to see a bigger shot of my hairy wrist)

Another interesting (to me) bit about SRO is the number available per game varied.  Even though all the games were sold out, they had ~100 tickets for Chaminade game, which went down to around 75 for the UCLA game and we heard the finals game only had 30ish SRO tickets available.  I would have thought sellout = sellout no matter what, but I haven’t been putting on a basketball tournament for 32 years either.  The bonus of it all was we got seats for each of the games.  Pretty sweet ones too.

On Monday we enjoyed the sun and met a friend of Sophia’s for lunch.  He used to work for Intel, but decided to semi-retire here so he sold all his stuff, bought a small condo in Kihei and then moved here.  He works as a valet for the Sheraton enough hours per week to get benefits and just enjoys life the rest of the time.  Super nice guy. 

We then went to the pep rally.  I am not sure what I expected….I guess to be honest, I was picturing a high school kind of thing where the coach comes out to talk up the fans and maybe a player or two or three.  Yeah…none of that happened.  There were snacks out with a cash bar and then the cheerleaders did some cheering before the alumni association president got up to thank us for being there (don’t forget to join!) and then the Williams Fund president got up to cheer us on (don’t forget to keep donating!) and then it ended.  Lame.  I guess it was nice to see all the KU fans in one place…and they did have Jayhawk stickers but otherwise…yeah, no need to go to the next one.

After that we went to the game.  The game started at 4 and they brought the SRO people in about 5 minutes before it started…basically after everyone else should have been in.  As you may or may not know, we killed Chaminade.  Ded.

 

View for game 1.  About 3 rows up.

Tuesday we did the SRO early morning fun before heading to breakfast.  After that we went to the Blowhole out on northern Maui.  It’s a hole in the rock where the surf shoots through.  It was pretty cool and the scenery on the way there was sweet.  We cleaned up and hit the game against UCLA and again, we killed them.  Our seats for that were right behind the UCLA bench!  Pretty cool.

Blowhole in action

Spooge!

View along the coast

View from the parking area.  Waaaaay down there is the blowhole

 

Game 2's view.  A nice back shot of Coach Alford

Wednesday, we went into Lahaina to visit the dive shop we are going on a dive with on Friday.  We had to check in and see when we needed to be there Friday morning.  Tam and Sophia also wanted to get gifts for people and what not.  We got back to the condo and I went snorkeling for a little while until it was again time to head to the game.  We actually sat in the same seats as we did for the UCLA game except this time we were right behind the Jayhawk bench!  We were making (quiet) jokes about Self needing to sit down so we could see better.  It was interesting to hear him yell and drop f bombs from time to time.  Definitely gave a different perspective to the game.

 

Banyan tree in Lahaina

View for game 3...we are going to run the #1!!!  Anyone need some gatorade?

Yes, we were part of the huddle

Token Traylor photo for Sophia....she likes his delts

Today Tam and Sophia left in the morning and we shifted over to the Maalaea condo we will be in for the next couple of days.  A nice relaxing Thanksgiving before going to dive with hammerheads tomorrow…if we are lucky.  So one more blog on that one before heading back to reality.

Until then, remember: Our time, the people’s time

Love to all!

Jim

Kona, we love you!

Hey travel fans, it’s your intrepid explorer back out in the wilds…this time, Hawaii.  Stacy and I, along with friends, Tam and Sophia, are in Hawaii for a little relaxing, a little diving, and hopefully a little basketball in the form of KU playing the Maui Invitational.

We left rainy Portland this past Wednesday heading for Kona.  There is a night time Manta Ray dive that has been on Stacy’s list o’ things to do for a long time.  Sophia and I saw some Mantas in Thailand when we were there (scroll into the history on this site if you want more) but were always down for some more.  We stayed in Kona until yesterday (Saturday) before flying to Maui in the hopes of securing tickets to the Maui Invitational.  We couldn’t score tickets outside the crazy $2000+ per person travel packages so we figured we would try to get them here through scalping or mugging (kidding).  Plus if we can’t score tickets, we are still in Hawaii so it’s win/win either way!

First, let’s start out with: it is humid here.  Tropical island, humid, big surprise, right?  Yeah…it’s still humid and when away from the waterfront where there is no breeze, it’s pretty miserable.  But tech shirts prevail and my sweat is getting wicked away!

We went through VRBO for all our accommodations and the place in Kona was pretty sweet.  2 bedroom right on the water with a killer view.  Cannot complain at all.  It was about a mile down from where the cruise ships would dock so there was all kinds of touristy shops and restaurants there for the choosing.  Sadly, no one seconded my Bubba Gump Shrimp suggestion so we did not dine there.  We did hit the Kona Brewing Company brewpub and I can highly recommend it.  Good beer, good food, and super nice staff.  If you are ever in Kona and like beer, go for it!  For pictures, remember: click to embiggen

 

View from the Condo...not bad :)

We really only had one day to tour around (Thursday) because Friday, Stacy, Sophia and I were going to do 2 morning dives and then 2 night dives with only a 3 hour break between.  For Thursday we went to Volcano National Park which was pretty much on the other side of the island from Kona.  It was about a 2 and a half hour drive but the drive wasn’t too bad as far as scenery goes.  Saw some wild peacocks and other critters along the way. 

Of course, it started to rain as soon as we got to the park.  Luckily the information center conveniently sold plastic ponchos so we got at least some protection.  The info center also has wall displays with time categories.  Starting with “if you have 2-3 hours, see these 3 things” and “if you have 4-6 hours, see these extra things” and so on.  The 3 we did see were pretty cool: the caldera, the steam vents and the lava tube.

The clouds sort of parted when we got to the caldera so you can definitely see the steam rising up.  If we had been able to stay until after dark, you can see it glow from the magma inside, but we had to get back to Kona to check in for the dives the following day.

 

Caldera with the steam coming up

The steam vents are just what they sound like: vents where steam, nice warm steam, comes out.  The crazy thing is you can see the vents through trees on the side of the hill too.  Crazy.

 

Stacy, getting some steam action

Those whisps of "clouds" are steam coming up through the trees

The lava tube was sort of nice, but also flooded midway through and it was DUMPING rain when we got there.  So, neat to see, but could have skipped it.

 

Blurry, but best photo I got of the lava tube

On the way back to Kona we stopped off at the Punalu’u sweet bread factory.  They had these fried, cinnamon & sugar covered sweet breads that were donut like.  They also had guava flavored (pretty good) and a cinnamon swirl loaf that Stacy grabbed which was awesome.

 

Want some bread?

Friday saw us at the harbor heading out for a couple of dives with Big Island Divers.  They were great.  Super nice crew and very helpful, etc.  The two morning dives were pretty good.  Saw a manta on the first dive of the day as well as TONS of fish, eels, coral, etc.  Sadly, no turtles.  I tried to convince Stacy that was enough manta to last so we could skip the night manta dive, but she wasn’t buying that.  The one downer was a fairly rookie diver had issues with buoyancy and shot to the surface and back down WAY to fast on the first dive.  We got back to the boat and found her breathing on the oxygen bottle which is never a good sign.  Her throwing up shortly afterwards had us heading back to the harbor to get her to medical help because you don’t mess around with that kind of stuff.  We had a brief stop there to get her to the paramedics before we headed back out for the second dive.  I guess the crew had to do a litmus test for alcohol (which they passed) I guess for liability. 

 

Hermit Crab in the middle

Sohpia and Stacy left to right closest to me

Fire Angel fish...supposedly only found in Hawaii.

What's going on out here?

Stacy super excited after the manta swam by (seen in the background)

After the two morning dives, we ate at the Big Island Grill.  Crap I forget the name of the dish, but I had the beef patty on rice with 2 eggs covered with gravy.  I had heard about it before and boy was it good.  Set me up for the night dives.

Back at the harbor with Big Island Divers, we set out for the 2 night dives with a new but still awesome crew.  Mikey, the captain, did a pretty awesome trick of keeping an orange off the ground with only the air from a tank.  You get it spinning in the airflow off you hand and if it spins fast enough, the air flow and spinning keeps it floating.  You have to see it. 

Anyway, the first dive was the manta night dive.  You can also do this as a snorkeler if you want to.  The dive is the #1 rated night dive in the world and also the #1 rated night snorkel (actually the only night snorkel) so we were pretty excited.  They basically use a lot of bright lights to make the plankton think its day time and start getting active.  Manta’s feed on the plankton so they come around and then swim all around you.  Each of the divers also get a pretty bright light to hold onto for more plankton.

I guess the one downside of the dive was there was a ton of surge pushing you back and forth.  We had to hold onto the remaining coral chunks (they do this dive a LOT but always in the same spot so it’s sort of been crunched down by all the divers) in order to not roll around into our fellow divers.  Plus the first spot we started at only had one manta in about 20 minutes.  I was worried we weren’t going to see much, but out dive master (DM) came and got us and took us to another spot where 6 mantas were frolicking and feeding for the rest of the dive.  It was pretty spectacular.  Highly recommend it if you get the chance.  I didn’t talk to any of the snorkelers that also went but if they even saw half of what we did, it would be worth it.  Super cool dive.

Blurry Manta...I got more movies than pictures, but they are long

Movie is pixilated due to the site's massaging...and you can see me shooting all over the place due to the surge, but at least you can see some of the manta action

We went back to the harbor to drop off the snorkelers before heading out to the 2^nd dive of the evening: the black water dive.  For this one, they take you out to where the depth is around 2 miles and then have 6 weighted ropes about 40 feet long: 2 at either side of the boat in the front, middle, and back.  Then they hook you onto a 10 foot tether that they then attach to one of the ropes and you basically drift along and check out anything that comes along….like a hungry shark looking for 6 idiots hanging like bait from the bottom of a boat.  We each had a pretty good light but that was all the illumination that was there.  Really usually you see things about the size of the last digit of your thumb, but they are translucent and alien looking. 

I volunteered to go in first…which was scary exciting.  I did the stride into the water and then the captain walked me around to the rope I was going to be tethered to and tethered me up.  I then descended where the DM, Dillon, made sure I was okay before going to look after the next person in the water.  I got to admit I was a little freaked at this point about being the only person in there (Dillon was far enough away he didn’t count) in pitch black water but I calmed myself and then started to see these tiny creatures that were awesome.  Sadly, I didn’t get many good photos mainly because you have to hold the light across it and then take a picture perpendicular to that light and it turns out they move fairly quickly in the current and I am not very coordinated.  But I did get a couple that look pretty cool.

The head was about thumb size...had the rainbow light effect

about the size of a thimble.  Pretty cool looking

Its coming right at us!.  No idea what it is and blurry but whatareyougoingtodo?

Another shot of a critter like the first one

Short film of a spidery critter

We all survived and got back to shore around 12:30 or so.  Very late and we were super tired after 4 dives.  The next day, we got up, packed, ate lunch and then flew on an island jumper over to Maui.  The plane was hands down the smallest I have ever been on, but it was pretty cool and fairly cheap so I can’t complain.  Plus no TSA (we left from the commuter terminal) so even better.

Anyone see Buddy Holly or the Big Bopper?  Yes, I am old....whatever

No, the wheels do not retract in flight

No locking cockpit doors on this plane!

We made it to our condo and hit Maui Brewing company last night.  While they have awesome beer, their service sort of blew (like they were doing us a favor by waiting on us) and the food was just okay.  One funny bit was Tam convinced us to try these Japanese peppers where supposedly 1 in 10 is super hot but the rest are mild.  Shishido peppers.  Someone messed up the ratio or we got “lucky” because for us is was more like 1:2 and damn those things were HOT.  I don’t think I will be trying them again J

That’s it for now.  We are going to try to figure out the best way to try to get tickets tomorrow and explore a little bit.  Stacy and I are here through the week while Tam and Sophia head back on Turkey Day.  More to follow…

Love to all!

Our time, the people’s time,

Jim