Kaanapali to B&B - too far?

[webbah]

Hi - my family is going to Maui for 10 days over Christmas and we'll have a group of 5 divers included. Want to dive 4-5 days minimum - possibly some of those being shore dives. I've never been to Maui but we'll have a car - is B&B's shop too far to go from Kaanapali Shores condos? They seem to have the setup I want (pricing and smaller boats). Or should we stick to Lahaina divers or Extended Horizons? How far of a drive is it? To Kihei isn't it?

Thanks in advance!

Jim

 

[Charlie99]

For the early morning trip to the boat, it will be 50 minutes to an hour if you stay on the highway in Kihei until Keonekai Rd, just past MileMarker 9. It's on the south end of Kihei, so initially follow the signs for Wailea and stay on the bypass highway rather than taking the turnoff for Kihei and going the whole length of S. Kihei Rd.

It's worth trip at least once in order to get a ride out to Molokini Crater.

 

[kidspot]

and the drive is much shorter than taking a boat from Lahaina. For gear/air fills you'll find Pacific Dive in Lahaina has similar rates to B&B. http://www.pacificdive.com

Aloha, Tim

 

[nescubasteve]

Last March I stayed at Papakea in Kaanapali and dove with B&B four days. Traffic was virtually non-existant on way to the boat and since it departs so early, I was back in Kaanapali by 10:00, 10:30 at the latest all four days.

Well worth it in my opinion. Good luck on your trip!
Steve

 

[DiveMaven]

We stay on Kaanapali Beach when we're on Maui and always do the drive down to the Kihei boat ramp to catch charters to S. Maui and Molokini (we go with ERDA). The early morning drive was 45 minutes with little traffic, but it usually took us at least an hour to get back at around noon.

Since we're talking about winter vacation and super-high season, I know we'll be planning for an hour to get to Kihei in the mornings to make sure we don't miss our boat! (we'll be there for 10 days at Christmas this year too)

 

[pterantula]

Might I recommend Extended Horizons for the Northern area, and Mike Severns for Molokini - Pauline @ Severns literally wrote the book on the place.

Cheers, have a great time...

 

[Al Mialkovsky]

Severns doesn't do a dive briefing, he does a very extended dive education. That's not for everyone and the nice thing about B&B is they won't try to sell you a book.

I love diving with B&B and this trip two of our friends are staying up there and the drive was more than worth it. We get back to the ramp at 9:30 usually.

Here's a couple of pictures I took on todays dive.

 

[calscubagirl]

Wow! Beautiful shots Al!! Thanks for sharing.

 

[jeffrey-c]

Looks like most have indicated that they feel it wasn't too far a drive from Kaanapali to the Kihei ramp, but I'll toss in my two cents of a dissenting opinion. At my last Maui trip a couple years ago I did the same, driving down from just north of Kaanapali to Kihei for my diving. Near the end of the week I have to admit I was getting REAL tired of getting up too early and spending nearly a couple hours driving each day, and vowed to either stay in Wailea or dive closer next time I visit. Five days of doing that trip for diving was about 9-10 hours in the car - that's almost a whole day's worth of time out of a precious week of vacation!

 

[DiveMaven]

You're right, it's a lot of time in a car if you're doing it multiple times...BUT, if you want to dive Molokini, you have 2 choices: drive or ride in a boat.

If you choose the boat ride (which is gorgeous and fun), you're choosing to dive with Lahaina Divers. If you choose driving, you have a whole bunch of operators to choose from, and only have a 15 minute (max) ride out to Molokini.