jonhall
Contributor
Spent 2 weeks at Paniolo Greens in Waikoloa Village which is located in South Kohala about 25 miles north of Kona and about 5-6 miles from the shore. Was a little worried about elevation and diving but Waikoloa Village is just under 1000'. On non-diving days we hugged the coast site-seeing and doing a snorkeling and a dinner cruise and went to the higher elevations a couple of days to visit some parks. Needless to say, Volcano National Park's Kilauea looked different than in 2013 when we were there the last time.
Dove with Blue Wilderness Dive Adventures for 5 days. Got a deal not advertised on their website - a 10 boat trip package - which my buddy and I split the 10 days and cost of. It took the $140 a day cost down to about $109. Communication through email was good. We went their store in the Queens Shoppes in the Waikoloa Beach Resort area to set up our dives. Confirmation of payment and dive days were emailed to me.
Blue Wilderness uses a RIB which was new for me to dive from. They are fast but there is little shade.I liked it! Seating could be in the center of the boat or on the inflated tubes. There wasn't a lot of space between the two, but the procedure they have in place makes it pretty easy. Bags could be stowed below the center seats while fins and other small gear could be held in place by a rope running the length of the side tubes. Tanks and bc's were kept in the back of the RIB. When we were ready to dive, tanks were attached to the outside of the RIB - we jumped in and put our gear on in the water. Having pretty calm water everyday, I liked the method. Harder to imagine it being much fun in choppy waters. My buddy and I are the only 2 divers on our first day. Other days we had 3, 5, 7, and 11 (which is their max.) Because everyone gets out of the RIB at basically the same time, they also put on BC's at the same time. The DM's (we had 2 when we had 5 or more people) helped those that needed help. BC's and fins were removed and handed up at the end of dives. Crew changed the tanks. The dive plans were brief when we arrived at a site. Surface intervals were done in the boat. They took care of our gear and had it on the boat the next day we dove. Water, juice, and fantastic chocolate chip macadamia nut cookies were available. Staff in the store and on the boat were friendly and knowledgeable.
For the end of Oct./first of Nov., the water was unusually warm at 82º F, which we were told was leading to bleaching of coral. Aluminum tanks are used - dive times were 60+ minutes. You could dive your air even if others had to go up. A swell affected the visibility 2 of the days - about 50' - others days were about 60-70' of good viz. Depths of the dives ranged between 40 - 70'. We dove from Puako Bay at sites located around numbers 4 and 5 on the map below. Highlights of what we saw were a pair of mantas, an eagle ray, dragon wrasse, yellow frogfish, leaf scorpionfish, sponge crab, crown of thorns starfish, many octopi and Hawaiian slipper lobsters amongst the normal reef critters. Went through a lot of tunnels, saw quite a bit of coral. I thought the diving here was as good as when we were in Kona 6 years ago with one exception - I didn't see 100 spinner dolphins with a pod of 4-5 that broke away and swam right to me. Still good dives though!
Dove with Blue Wilderness Dive Adventures for 5 days. Got a deal not advertised on their website - a 10 boat trip package - which my buddy and I split the 10 days and cost of. It took the $140 a day cost down to about $109. Communication through email was good. We went their store in the Queens Shoppes in the Waikoloa Beach Resort area to set up our dives. Confirmation of payment and dive days were emailed to me.
Blue Wilderness uses a RIB which was new for me to dive from. They are fast but there is little shade.I liked it! Seating could be in the center of the boat or on the inflated tubes. There wasn't a lot of space between the two, but the procedure they have in place makes it pretty easy. Bags could be stowed below the center seats while fins and other small gear could be held in place by a rope running the length of the side tubes. Tanks and bc's were kept in the back of the RIB. When we were ready to dive, tanks were attached to the outside of the RIB - we jumped in and put our gear on in the water. Having pretty calm water everyday, I liked the method. Harder to imagine it being much fun in choppy waters. My buddy and I are the only 2 divers on our first day. Other days we had 3, 5, 7, and 11 (which is their max.) Because everyone gets out of the RIB at basically the same time, they also put on BC's at the same time. The DM's (we had 2 when we had 5 or more people) helped those that needed help. BC's and fins were removed and handed up at the end of dives. Crew changed the tanks. The dive plans were brief when we arrived at a site. Surface intervals were done in the boat. They took care of our gear and had it on the boat the next day we dove. Water, juice, and fantastic chocolate chip macadamia nut cookies were available. Staff in the store and on the boat were friendly and knowledgeable.
For the end of Oct./first of Nov., the water was unusually warm at 82º F, which we were told was leading to bleaching of coral. Aluminum tanks are used - dive times were 60+ minutes. You could dive your air even if others had to go up. A swell affected the visibility 2 of the days - about 50' - others days were about 60-70' of good viz. Depths of the dives ranged between 40 - 70'. We dove from Puako Bay at sites located around numbers 4 and 5 on the map below. Highlights of what we saw were a pair of mantas, an eagle ray, dragon wrasse, yellow frogfish, leaf scorpionfish, sponge crab, crown of thorns starfish, many octopi and Hawaiian slipper lobsters amongst the normal reef critters. Went through a lot of tunnels, saw quite a bit of coral. I thought the diving here was as good as when we were in Kona 6 years ago with one exception - I didn't see 100 spinner dolphins with a pod of 4-5 that broke away and swam right to me. Still good dives though!
