Kona night dives on the reef?

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Liquid Cosmos
Hadn't heard of them before - so looked them up - not sure if I'm seeing it right or missing something, but they look to be about $100 more for a 2 tank dive than other ops on the island. Glad you're diving days with someone else. Do you know what LC is charging for their twilight/night dive?

Too bad so few ops offer an actual night dive other than the black water dive or the twilight/manta combo.

I think you'll like diving up on the Kohala Coast, especially at night. I've seen life there that I didn't see at the Kona sites. There are also mantas up that way.
 
How was your trip?
We enjoyed it. We enjoy diving everywhere lol. We got blown out for our night dive but ended up really enjoying the manta night dive. Here's my dive report that I posted to social media if you're interested in the details. It's pretty long winded so I'll probably need to split it up....


The diving around the Kona Coast was good. Of course it was. I did the research and decided there were opportunities to see some epic creatures. Mainly for me, tiger sharks, including the venerable and infamous “Laverne” who haunts Honokohau Harbour, reef manta rays and the elusive and shy dragon moray eel. I knew that Hawaiian monk seals would be around but I doubted we’d get lucky enough to encounter the rarest pinniped in the world. But you never know and that’s the beauty of the whole thing. You giant stride or back roll off the boat and anything can happen. I love that uncertainty.

The dive shop we chose was a good operation. The boats are big and comfortable, the divemasters are knowledgeable and they allow you to dive your tank. We loved Costa Rica but they ended every dive at 40 minutes and we never got back on the boat with less than 1200psi which is nearly half a tank of gas left. When you only get a limited amount of time each year to do this stuff, that’s a huge disappointment. Our dives in Hawaii averaged 60-80 minutes and for that we were grateful.

Speaking of “grateful” I learned while we were on the boat one day from a fellow diver that The Grateful Dead’s Jerry Garcia was an obsessive scuba diver at the tail end of his life and spent much of his time diving around Kona. It was his generosity that allowed the current mooring system there to be implemented. Each dive site has floating moorings just underwater that the boat can tie off on, so as to not disturb and damage the reef by dropping and dragging an anchor on it. It’s a fairly common system worldwide these days but it requires resources to install. Jerry put up the money for it to happen in Kona. Pretty cool. I had no idea he was a diver. Respect and R.I.P.

The dive sites we experienced on the west side of the island were all pretty similar for the most part, shallow and not all that dynamic. To the west a slope down the sand out to deep water, sprawling, flat fields of hard corals slowly ascended towards the shore where the rocky, volcanic coast created some more interesting topography including some arches and swim throughs but also a reasonable amount of surge to contend with in that shallower water. The sea was relatively warm and I wore a 3mm full wetsuit although there were times I felt I didn’t need it. Better to be a little warm than cold though. The water was electric blue and clear forever. Unbelievably beautiful in contrast to the dull colors of the reef. For some reason the corals around the Big Island, while abundant, are not that vivid compared to the Caribbean. Occasionally I’d stumble across an area covered by smooth mounding porites that resemble melting mushrooms. Those would sometimes be a very soft and pastel green and blue.

The reef fish more than make up for it. There are many strange, brightly colored and dynamic fish everywhere. Yellow tangs dart in and out of the corals, peacock groupers being serviced by the incredibly striking Hawaiian cleaner wrasse, schools of raccoon butterflies, pyramid butterflies and orange band surgeonfish hovering in the water column, Achilles tangs, long snout butterflyfish, bluefin trevally, endless varieties of moray eel under every other rock and free swimming. We found various species of nudibranch, two giant Commerson’s frogfish which was an absolute score and another first. I even got to witness the namesake behavior of the adult rock mover wrasse who picks up and slams down huge pieces of coral rubble bigger than itself when feeding. Flame and Potter’s angelfish, peacock razor wrasse juveniles and adults. Massive black urchin sex orgies! There’s a lot to see down there and much of it for us was for the first time.

Continued in next comment.
 
How was your trip?
At the beginning of our second day we had just cleared the entrance to Honokohau Harbor when someone clocked a pod of dolphins. The divemasters decided maybe that would be a good place to start the day. You think? Sadly it was on this site that our first criticisms of the dive operation became apparent. But I was optimistic and excited. I knew if we were going to encounter Laverne or any of her tiger shark cousins this would be the most likely place. We rushed to get geared up. The dolphins were all around the boat. Then, the divemaster did an extended dive briefing pulling out the same fish identification guide and slowly described the same fish that we may or may not encounter while down there. Dude, there are dolphins right there in the water! The other divemaster already had his group in the water for five minutes and ours didn’t even have his gear on yet. We told him we’d go ahead and get in and wait for them at the mooring line as we do in just about every other place we’ve been.

So Jess and I jumped into the ocean hoping for the best but not expecting much by this point. We floated on the surface while the bubbles from our entry cleared and it was just then that I saw them on my right. A pod of about 12 spinner dolphins slowly came by to check us out. They swam just in front of us, twirling and showing off for my camera. And that was that. The last we saw of them. The other divers in our group never even got a glimpse of them. We spent the next hour underwater with our heads on a swivel looking everywhere for the resident tiger sharks but they never came to visit. We struck out on tigers in Hawaii. In fact we didn’t see one shark on our entire trip. It’s funny how scared people are to be in the sea because they imagine sharks lurking everywhere, waiting to ferociously attack anything they encounter. And here I am in Costa Rica and Hawaii trying to find bull sharks and tiger sharks where they are famously known to be and nothing. I can’t find them and they’re starting to give me a complex.

There are many invertebrates on the reefs around Kona but none as cool as the Hawaiian day octopus. I read about them and watched a number of videos featuring their apparent bold diurnal namesake behavior. We found quite a few of them on our dives but what we discovered was that the day octopus is a very shy animal. We also discovered our second criticism of the diving company we were with. Whenever the divemasters found one hiding in its den, they attempted to poke and prod it out into the open. We witnessed this multiple times to the point that whenever I found one I wouldn’t even tell them anymore and just observe them in their den. Big alien eyes staring out at us with apprehension. I would too if every time I encountered a human they poked at my face with a metal stick. Bad form indeed. One octopus I found hilariously blew sand at me every time I looked into the hole at him. Good for you little guy. We don’t deserve to witness how clever they are.

My two favorite encounters though were when on our third day Jess found me a dragon moray. I couldn’t have been more stoked to see this guy for the first time. I remember them from my saltwater aquarium days. Such a crazy looking little creature with beautiful orange, white and black spots, the horns of a dragon on its head and massive rows of scary looking teeth so big the animal can barely close its mouth. But it was a very shy creature hiding in the finger corals looking so much like them I never would’ve noticed it on my own. Then, later on the next dive a big spotted eagle ray casually glided up over the reef ahead of us. I assumed it would continue on its way as they typically do but I was wrong. It turned and came back towards the coral and rubble and began to feed. It smooshed its face into the rubble and crunched on the rock to get at whatever was hiding within. It did this for a while and I slowly and cautiously moved closer with my camera, always watching closely for signs of discomfort or agitation. I didn’t want to interrupt it. But it allowed me to come closer than I’ve ever been to one of its kind and I got some of the best footage I’ve ever taken of any animal.

On our last day we did an “advanced long range trip” with the dive company. We expected deeper, more challenging conditions based on the briefing. Ultimately the dives were about the same as the others but just a bit further south. The topography was a nice change on the first site called “The Dome” though. It was more dynamic than the usual spots with huge tables and holders of lava rock and ledge formations. We spotted a lot of eels, nudibranchs and even two hunting parties. One consisted of a cooperative team of goldsaddle goatfish, jacks, groupers and a free swimming yellow margin moray eel. The other was the same but with a rather bold octopus joining who immediately changed color from reef camo to bright red when he spotted me and sank slowly into hiding.

Underwater, Hawaii was a pretty cool experience and we enjoyed what we saw. Im not sure it compared to Volcanoes National Park but the diving was very casual and easy compared to other places. The life was diverse and abundant, the reefs are healthy around Kailua Kona. We’ll probably not go back though. It’s ******* expensive to dive in Hawaii. More than twice as much as in a place like Mexico and while we saw a lot of cool things, many for the first time, I find diving in a place like Cozumel, South Florida or Saba way more challenging and fun. Did I mention we didn’t see any sharks?

We spent our mornings diving and our afternoons resting mostly. We had one day of diving canceled due to unfavorable ocean conditions which was actually pretty cool because we got to check out Hāpuna Beach State Recreation Area. We drove about 30 minutes north and it was easy to find. We even ran into some more friendly Nene geese in the parking lot begging for food. They didn’t get any from us. The beach was incredible and we enjoyed watching the sunset there on the expansive white sand. Our favorite meal was nearby at a place carefully named Seafood Bar & Grill. Hey, it did what it said it would do. We sat outside overlooking a beautiful fuel refinery and had killer Mai Tai’s and the best calamari ever. They don’t chop the mantle into rings but serve it fried in steaks. It was tender and perfect. I got a lobster pot pie that was just pretty tasty too. Overall the food on the Big Island was kind of a mystery that we didn’t have enough time to solve. Especially being confined to the low elevation tourist area around Kona. But we had a few good meals. I had a decent burger one night at some TGI Fridays type place. Tha Poke Shack was pretty epic and the shave ice was wild too. Shave ice is like a giant Baltimore snowball with crazy tropical flower flavors like lilikoi and pog, whatever the hell that is. I ate it and it was delicious and made my throat and brain seize up like I was having a stroke. Good times!

The videos are very long. I edit them as more of a scrapbook for myself and my family but if you're curious they're here.


 
Someone still remembers Jack London? I am impressed :)
 
Someone still remembers Jack London? I am impressed :)
Jack was one of the great literary masters in my opinion. His novel Martin Eden is one of my favorites. He knew a little something about the sea too!
Jack-London-copy.jpeg
 

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