Christmas Mantas made an appearance

[Shaka Doug]

No dice on the mantas or eagle rays today. Visibility was about 30-35' once you got out but kind of poor inshore. Who told you it was less than 15 feet??

Makena Landing was pretty good but really crowded (come to think of it, Ulua was packed too!). Water was extra calm and the vis was close to 50. We saw a 4' white-tip in the toilet bowl. That was the highlight for me. We also saw 4 turtles and a few eels but I liked the way the shark was silhoutted in the tunnel the best.

 

[kidspot]

An instructor getting out said that in 20ft of water they could not see the bottom and that it was a bad day out there... I inferred that meant it was less than the 15ft window... could have been wrong though.

 

[KrisB]

We were there at 9:30 and talked to Paula -- doing the CESA's in 23' (likely attached to one of the moorings at the end of 1st reef), she couldn't quite see the bottom from the surface. So ~20' vertical viz... and vertical is usually better than horizontal.

 

[Shaka Doug]

That's typically the area where things start to change and get much better if you give it just a minute or more of swimming out. Yesterday wasn't too bad at Ulua. We saw an eagle ray again on Saturday and the vis. seems to be improving. That's 5 ray sightings for me there last week. Looking forward to another good week of diving to get the new year off to a good start.

Happy New Year everyone!!

 

[KrisB]

Wow... what amazing experiences!

I was helping out with a Nav Adventure dive yesterday at Keawakapu, and partway through the exercises, in the middle of the sand, we look and there's this manta just cruising by... a nice treat for a dive that was otherwise skill-driven.

Of course, Lanai on Saturday was just GORGEOUS... wish I could do those dives every day.

 

[Shaka Doug]

Hey, look's like the Christmas Mantas need to be re-named...saw them again. I'm calling them the New Year's Mantas now! I hope they stick around for a while. They were awesome today. I think they were feeding on the surgeon]fish spawn. We were watching the fish dart to the surface and spawn today and then the mantas cruised right through and had their mouths opened up to eat up all the spooge! Crazy! Has anyone ever seen this before???

 

[DiveMaven]

Last Thursday (12/28) we were treated to dropping in on 5 Eagle Rays on our first dive and a Manta on our second. Both were S. Maui dives near Wailea. It doesn't get much better than that!

 

[justleesa]

Congrats on you luck Doug! Guess you could use the stamp

Here are your pics

 

[Shaka Doug]

Thanks Lisa! ....now how did you do that??

 

[justleesa]

Rigth click the picture and copy the link you find in the properties. Then when posting click the

button and insert the link. That should do the trick