Maui #5 - Snorkelling Success!!

This morning, I took a short walk along the beach across from our complex. I wanted to see if the sea would be quiet enough for us to snorkel there. I was a little concerned about our snorkelling, since I had such a hard time with it the other day. I just couldn't do it at all. The salt water kept getting into my eyes and I felt very panicky when I had to breathe through the snorkel. I was afraid I wasn't going to be able to do this!

It was still quite early (and a little cool), so the beach only had a few people setting up their towels and chairs. I walked a few minutes down the beach, watching the surf. It looked as rough as the day before to me, but there were no red flags out -- until I turned around to go home and saw that the life guards were putting up the red flags behind me as I walked along.

OK, so no snorkeling here today. I went back home and checked my Maui guides for other nearby snorkeling beaches that would be good for beginners. Ulua Beach was mentioned and it was only a couple of miles down the road, so off we went.

Ulua Beach is in a very beautiful, expensive area. It has beautiful sand, grassy edges and a good amount of shade. The snorkelling is around a rocky reef outcropping at the end of the beach. The water is quite shallow and, because of its position relative to the prevailing winds and waves, is very sheltered. Perfect for us!

We set up shop in the shade of a tree and waded into the water. Even beyond the small breaking waves, the depth was still no more than waist deep on Hilary. It was easy to get our equipment on and practice breathing without being overwhelmed by the waves.

Success!!! If I concentrated on breathing slowly in and out and didn't try to move around too much, I could easily and calmly view -- the sand on the bottom!

So Hilary and I slowly, hand in hand, floated and swished our way along the edge of the reef. And then I started to have trouble breathing again, but this time because I was so excited at the sight of all the tropical fish we could see. There were yellow and blue and green and black. Some were spotted and some were striped. Some of the first fish we saw were a number of needlefish -- long skinny fish with very pointy faces. They seem to float just below the surface of the water. When Hilary saw them, she started to get very nervous and didn't want to go near them. Then, when we saw a Spotted Pufferfish, she wanted to go in. But, I kept reassuring her that the fish were used to snorkellers and were not going to hurt us. For the next half hour we ranged back and forth along the reef, watching all the little critters. It was just magical!

After a short rest back on the beach, we went back in for another half hour. Because we didn't have any flotation belts yet, we kept pretty much to our own depth. Even here, we watched many, many different kinds of fish. Just before we left for the day, Hilary said, "Listen to the whales!" She'd realized that we could actually hear the whales sing if we quietly put our faces in the water. I held my breath and, yes, I could faintly hear the whales singing! What a great morning! Now I'm not dreading our boat cruise to Molokini on Monday.

During the afternoon, we went to the Maui Ocean Center. It's not Sea World, but has great collections of reef fish, including many of the ones we'd just been watching. We spent a very enjoyable few hours there.

On our way home, we made another stop at Hilo Hatties -- collecting two more free necklaces in the process. Hilary also bought a mussel -- hopefully containing a cultured pearl. In fact, someone gave her a two-for-one coupon, so she actually got two mussels. And they contained two BEAUTIFUL pearls. One is a creamy colour and one is -- believe it or not -- PINK!!! She had the pink one set in a gold flower setting. It is just gorgeous.

This has been a very successful day.

Aloha!