Trip almost over. Going home today. Last of the travel pics!
What to do to occupy our time in the morning? Uumm. Just kicking around, picking up some gifts for friends, we spied the submarine store. Oh sure, why not. We've been on the sub in Kona harbor plenty of times but never in Lahaina. Taking the early morning trip we'd still have time for lunch before heading to the airport.
The sub is waiting about 1 1/2 miles down from the marina, moored to its little nursemaid tugboat., "Roxie". We passengers are ferried down via a pleasant, short ocean boat ride. The sub looks identical to the one located in Kona. Same company operates both, so we anticipate a nice trip.
The water was exceptionally clear this morning. Visibility must be at least 100'. Pretty good! And we start seeing fish immediately as the sub begins to dive. In fact we saw all sorts of fish and coral formations throughout the trip. Including a shark! Wow! Never saw a shark before on one of the sub trips. I'm told that it's not common to see a shark.
White tipped reef shark.
At the deepest part of the trip, the sub actually settles down to sit briefly on the bottom. 128 feet deep. That's about 25' deeper than the Kona sub trip.
After touch down, we head back to the surface. After transferring everybody back onto the ferry, we head back to Lahaina marina........passing what is jokingly referred to as the "unemployment line" -- a line of local surfers waiting for a good wave to ride.
The local unemployment lines can be seen all over these islands. The locals show up as soon as it gets light enough to see, just about dawn, and stay till 5 pm (or when the sharks start to feed). Meals are eaten on the beach, but most of their time is spent on the water. What a life. Not what I'm looking for, but obviously it fits their style.
No comments:
Post a Comment