Matt and I traveled to Hawaii (the big island) at the beginning of December with about 17 of our friends (some of whom we didn’t know yet). TJ Gomez, our amazing golf pro and friend, puts trips together about four times a year for golf, fun, relaxation, drinking…the list goes on. I’m not much of a golfer (I enjoy it but I’m really not good yet), so I went along for the ride and for the photo opps. And boy, did they present themselves. I was especially keen on finding a black sand beach – I’d explored them online and found the beaches I wanted to visit, not knowing that one (ahem…Kehena) was a nude beach until I got there with my camera and was chastised by one of the beachgoers (at least his dog was nice). Anywhoo…I came across several honu, the Hawaiian word for “green sea turtles,” at one of the most beautiful black sand beaches (Punalu’u), which was a thrill for me – I love those little guys.
In addition to the solo exploring, we also did several things as a group – a luau, ziplining through the jungle, visiting Kilauea before the volcano blew its top (again) – but the best, most awesome thing was night snorkeling with manta rays. These creatures are completely harmless – no barbs like sting rays, no teeth, not aggressive – and incredibly beautiful. We were forbidden by law to touch them intentionally, but one rubbed up against my hand twice. 😊
Our crew from My Kona Adventures was fantastic. There are many other tour companies that run the manta experience, some of which take groups of 15-20 people or more, but I’d highly recommend MKA. There were 11 of us on the boat so it was very intimate. We suspended ourselves on top of the water by holding onto a surfboard-like thing with VERY bright lights underneath to attract plankton, and in turn, the mantas. Our legs were floating on top of pool noodles to keep us flat in the water. The mantas moved so gracefully under water, it was like they were flying…they learned that they collect more plankton if they flip upside down with their bellies close to the surface, so there were lots of barrel rolls and acrobatics. At one point there were two mantas very close together and it looked like a ballet when they flipped over.
If you go, and I highly recommend you do if given the chance, bear in mind a few small things. One, the ocean isn’t *warm* at night in December, but it was still completely tolerable. We rented wetsuit tops for $5 each and that probably helped. Two, invest in a GoPro or other stationary underwater camera – keeping a cell phone camera running while trying to hold onto a surfboard and dealing with the waves was not easy. Which brings me to three: if you have even a small amount of motion sickness, take Dramamine before you go out. It’s the ocean, after all, and the waves weren’t kind when we were out there – and you’re in the water dealing with it for about 45 minutes, more if you’re one of the last ones to get back on the boat at the end. One more thing…if you wear glasses, plan ahead. We purchased full face snorkel masks at Walmart & Target – I took the ear pieces off my glasses and placed them in the mask. It would’ve been better to tape them in, because they moved and I could only see out of one lens. Pretty comical, but also frustrating. Luckily my video didn’t need vision correction. The professionals with us cautioned against the full face masks, since there are issues with them and deep diving…but since this is on the surface, I don’t think it’s a problem.
The screenshots on this page show how incredibly close we were and what a fantastic experience we had. I’ve pieced together some of the better video frames I was able to capture – pardon the movement, but there was nothing I could do. 😊 The music attached is called “Flying over the Sea” by Δημήτρης Μαραντάς (DimMar Productions). Go to pixabay to check out his other songs!
