More water fun.

Yesterday we went to "turtle town" on the south side of the island.  By the time we got over there the conditions were pretty murky.  However we did see about 3-4 turtles!

My dad finally got a decent shot of the Humu Humu Nuku Nuku Apua'a (Rectangular triggerfish).

It's not the best shot in the world but these guys are so hard to get because they are so skittish.  Also, my dad and his point and shoot ended up getting the best shot of the day.

Today we found out that this was _not_ "turtle town"...  I guess we were close enough!!! ;-)

After being somewhat dissapointed with the murky conditions we headed up to the north end of the island to see what the windsurfers were doing with all the wind and surf which was kicking up the sand in the water...

They were making good use of those conditions...

A couple of them were getting some air.


But this was the best shot of the day...

So after having not so good conditions yesterday we decided to head out earlier today.  Also we went to a local spot, Kapulua Beach, which was easier to get to.  Kapulua Beach was nominated by Sunset Magazine for world's nicest beach.  I don't know if it won (probably not) but I can see why it would be nominated.  Unfortunately, we still had less than stellar conditions.

Murky conditions again.  :-(

But when we got close enough the shots were pretty good.

Rainbow Butterfly	Achilles Tangs
Unicornfish	Teardrop Butterfly (w/ Unicornfish in the back)

These 3 shots are of pretty small fish.  Kapalua is pretty shallow near the beach and there are a lot "juveniles" around.

And of course the Morish Idols were out.  This is a pretty good shot of this guy.

Morish Idol

We found a large puffer who was real friendly.  Once again my dad got the shot of the day on this guy.

But I got a pretty good shot of him as well.  I just wish he had been facing me for this shot.

The Saddle Wrasse seen here was following the puffer around.  Not sure what the relationship was...

Finally, heading out deeper we found a pretty good sized turtle.  And even deeper we saw a second one!!!  These guys are everywhere!

This final shot is not the best of a turtle per se but I like it.  It really shows some context of swimming with the turtles.  (That is my dad in the background.)

I think there was perhaps 4 other people out there with us.  Another couple we met at the showers said they had seen the turtle as well.  They are from New Jersey and come out to Maui every year.

I am really sorry Lorrie had to work and my ear was hurting at the beginning of this week.  I can only imagine how much more we could have seen.

Oh well all we can do is head back out in the morning...  Wish us luck,

More exploring.