Tag: Kona

Three Dives on a Holiday Weekend

We managed three dives last weekend. It was a holiday weekend, Kamehameha Day, that helped. But still, we average a couple dives a month, three dives in a weekend was a bit unusual. We dove with some friends at Pukao on Saturday. Then two more on the following Monday. This was conservative, a few of the guys dove on Sunday too!

Diver Down
Diver Mark Devenot cruising the reef at Hoover’s Towers north of Honokohau
Monday’s diving was with Dennis. Again he invited us out on his boat. The Aqua Safari is quite comfortable, a 42′ cabin cruiser outfitted for diving. There are plenty of tank racks, a big swim deck and a very nice ladder. Dennis is quick to point out one of the best features… A warm fresh water shower on the swim deck! Which, I have to admit, is rather nice.

Thus, Monday morning saw us packing up the dive gear, a cooler with drinks and sandwich makings for everyone, and heading for Honokohau. There Deb and I joined Dennis and Mark for a very nice day diving.

We have been diving a lot in the NELHA area lately, I expect we will be diving some more there. It is some spectacular diving in the area. A rich reef sloping out to a steep drop-off that descends far beyond scuba depths. You look into the deep blue and know that somewhere down there is the abyssal plain, 8,000 feet below.

As usual I had my face in the coral, in and out of every crevice or small cave I came across. This is a great way to find the little stuff I love to photograph, but you can miss the big stuff… A series a sharp clangs gets my attention, the sound of Mark’s tank banger. I pull myself out of an alcove and swim over the large coral outcropping just in time to see a ten foot manta sweep by! The manta was just beyond the reef drop-off, against the deep blue of open water.

The find of the day was a Spanish Dancer, the largest nudibranch found in the islands. I do mean large, while most nudi’s I locate are an inch or two long, this fellow was the size of a dinner plate. Dancers have another feature… They Dance! Actually a form of swimming through undulating the body. I flushed him out of a crevice in the cave and the nudi proceeded to dance for us, everyone got a good look. After a few photos, actually quite a few photos, I carefully shepherded the pretty fellow back into the crevice I found him in.

No dives this weekend, I was on call. But we are already planning another outing next weekend. Summer diving season is here, bringing calm and clear water to the Kona side. The crew is ready to go, discussing where we will dive next.

Diving South of Kona

I have not done much diving south of Kona, usually diving the shores close to home, the reefs of North and South Kohala. I have done a couple dives at Two Step, at Hōnaunau. The terrain is different further south, there are different species to see. Last weekend I got a chance to do some more diving down south.

This was made possible through a friend and fellow Keck engineer. Dennis owns a boat. Not just any boat… The Aqua Safari… A big boat, a fast boat, a dive boat, equipped for scuba, actually a pretty nice boat. I was invited to join the guys for a dive outing. I didn’t even ask where we were going, it really didn’t matter, I just wanted to dive.

Dropoff
Mark Devenot exploring the reef drop-off at Tanks
We headed south of Kona to a dive site I had never explored before, a place called Amphitheater. Just around the corner from the famous Kealakekua Bay, the site features some large sea caves carved into the cliffs by the winter waves. An excellent site, featuring good fish, numerous lava tubes, and good coral cover. Visibility was great, allowing good photographic conditions.

A find of the dive was a Bearded Cusk Eel hiding in a crevice at the base of a rock wall. I managed one half-decent photograph before it disappeared further into the crevice, out of sight. I guess it did not like the strobe, cusk eels are notoriously shy.

Mark, Patti and I shared the meal preparations. They had brought sandwich makings, I brought tuna mac, drinks and chips. Deb even sent a long a batch of home-made chocolate chip cookies. We ate well indeed.

The second dive site was Tanks, a site just north of the old Kona Airport and south of Honokohau. A fair amount of surge made mooring quite a challenge, we actually gave up on one mooring buoy, too close to the rocks where we were getting bounced around. There was quite a bit of surge underneath as well, and visibility was poor. At least poor by Kona standards, fairly good for most anywhere else. The surge and vis did not preclude a decent dive, we descended to the edge of the dropoff, where the slope plunges into the deep blue abyss. A few good photos, including a Undulated Moray. We spent the last part of the dive exploring a number of small caves just under the shoreline, where we found several white tip reef sharks, including one of the largest I had ever seen. This shark was a bit more than six feet, and quite rotund. He lived up to the scientific name for the species Triaenodon obesus.

A great day and a couple good dives. That was the goal, and that was what we achieved. Thanks Dennis!