Tues 12/17: Snorkeling On Lanai

We got up at 7:30, which meant 8 hours of sleep, yay!  We had to leave at 9:15 to get to the Dickenson St parking with Trilogy.  So we got our stuff together and ate breakfast at the condo.  I had cereal with soy milk.  Todd had two bags of popcorn.

We left and went downstairs to get towels for the trip.  Towel line was very slow and we were slightly late getting started.  Drove down to park, then walked a couple of blocks to the Pioneer Inn in Lahaina.  Right behind there was the harbor.  Our boat was the Trilogy VI.  We took Dramamine for the trip, because getting seasick and throwing up would be the worst and would ruin the trip.

Lanai out in the distance.  It was about a 90 minutes to motor over to Lanai.  The morning winds were calm so we didn’t sail.

We sat at the front of the boat next to a young couple who spoke Chinese.  Todd got to lay on the hammock at the front of the boat.

They served us homemade cinnamon rolls, which were yummy.

Then an hour later they served us turkey wraps and Coke.

We stopped twice to see whales!  Both times they were slightly too far away to get good photos.

All of our boat photos were taken with our Olympus waterproof camera.  The only other camera we brought was Todd’s GoPro Hero 2.  We left the other two cameras at the condo, along with both of our phones.  This information will come up later!

The Olympus actually took some nice photos on the boat.

Getting closer to the Lanai Harbor. 

We landed and walked about 8 minutes to the beach.

Trilogy is the only tour company with permission to take snorkelers to Hulopo’e Bay.  It is one of the top 10 snorkel spots in America.

Arrival and instructions from the captain.

We both got our snorkel equipment and got ready to go out to the bay.  I had the Olympus and Todd had the GoPro camera.  I got a quick photo of Todd as we got into the water.  Going from the beach was awesome!  I swam out only a little ways before seeing reefs and lots of fish!

And that was the last photo we took with the Olympus.  We’ve had it since 2009 and it’s been a great waterproof camera to take to the beach, surfing, into the pool, snorkeling at Kauai, and on Todd’s Tough Mudder runs.  But as soon as I took it into the water this time, water got into the battery & memory card compartment and it wouldn’t turn on.  I was snorkeling around on top of these great reefs, seeing all kinds of big and colorful fish, but was not able to capture any of it!  :-( 

Todd took his GoPro and took a few photos.  But the quality was not good.

Not only that, but after about 12 photos, the battery ran out.  Todd thought he had charged it full, the indicator had said it was charged.  But it was not.  So we only got a few blurry snorkeling photos, and then BOTH of our cameras that we brought for the day was out of commission.  :-(  Oh believe me, I was so sad!  So I have no photos for the rest of the trip.

I snorkeled for about 30-40 minutes, then went back to the beach, rinsed off, and ate some chips & salsa.  Todd went back out for about 10 more minutes, then he was done too.  We rinsed off and went for a walk on the trail.  We stopped by the tidepools and saw lots of little fish.  We walked to the end of the trail where we got a great view of Lover's Rock.  I was so sad we couldn't take any pictures of it.  Then we walked back to the beach, put down some mats, and relaxed.  Around 2:50 they gathered us up to the Pavilion where they served us a meal.  We had salads with oil & vinegar dressing and a bread roll.  We had vegetable stir fried yakisoba noodles.  We had some peas, and teriyaki chicken.  The food was pretty good.  After lunch, we sat on the lawn chairs until the captain said it was time to go back on the boat for the trip back.  I tried turning on the GoPro and managed to eek out one photo before it died again.  This was on the lawn chair at the Pavilion right after eating lunch and before heading back.

The trip back took 2 hours!  We sat at the front of the boat again.  The water was choppier and rougher on the way back, but we didn't feel sick at all because we took another Dramamine.  They served us ice cream with fudge, which was delicious.  They put up the sails and we cut the engine and sailed for a while when it was very windy.  About 2/3 of the way back, we saw a whale really close to the boat!  Saw the top of it while it dove and saw the tail!  Then a few minutes later on the other side of the boat we saw another whale about 25 feet away doing it again!  I can't believe we saw whales so close-up and couldn't take any photos!  :(  I kept trying to see if the Olympus would turn on, but no luck.  Water must have gotten in and damaged it.

We got back to the Lahaina harbor around 6pm.  Walked back to the parking lot and drove back. Had takeout beef chow fun from Honokowai Okazuya, a place in the same plaza as the Fish Market Maui.  We had take out food from there when we came to Maui with mom & dad in 2006.  Drove back to the hotel and relaxed.

Beef chow fun – we shared for dinner.

It was really nice to be at a resort with large enough units to have a separate dining and living area, where we can eat our take-out food at the dining table and watch TV!

And yea, someone’s hair got super-windblown!

I was sad to not have any photos from half of our trip.  But I was also very relieved when we came back home that we were able to salvage the photos we did take off of the Olympus memory card, even though it got wet.  If we couldn’t have done that, we would have virtually NO photos of the whole day!  I guess it’s time to look for a new waterproof camera or casing before our next vacation.  During the second half of the day, when I couldn’t take any photos, I concentrated on remembering the sights & sounds, and was fully immersed in the moments.  I knew I wasn’t going to be able to relive the memories through photos, so I tried to really enjoy the moments while they were happening.