Maui dive reports

[StuartT]

17 days on Maui. 6 days of diving. Unfortunately a big South swell for the first week and a half made shore diving impossible with 6-8 foot swells on the South shore. Did 5 days of boat diving. 3 with ed robinsons, 1 with b&b, and 1 with Lahaina divers to Lanai. Did manage to get in 3 shore dives after the swell settled down. 5 graves, Haloa point, and Ahihi bay. Saw lots of critters, grey, and white tips, dolphins underwater at 1st cathedrals, lots of eels including some rare ones, frogfish and lots of endemic fish to Hawaii, and of course lots of green sea turtles. All in all the diving was very good as usual. Never did get a night dive in will have to do that next time.

 

[Mark Derail]

Thanks for the update Stuart. If you can, give us lots more info on your dives. Times, depth, vis / temp.


I'm diving next week in Maui, staying in a condo on Kaanapali beach.
Hopefully I'll be able to shoredive / freedive right there.

I definitely want to see the catherals, I'm waiting to be onsite before booking anything.

Apparently some whales are in the area too. I'll post my experiences too.

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

Unfortunately a big South swell for the first week and a half made shore diving impossible with 6-8 foot swells on the South shore.

....

Never did get a night dive in will have to do that next time.

.... made South shore diving next to impossible for the first week and a half.

A scooter dive to the St. Anthony might have been possible; when I worked at the Wailea Renaissance I made that shore dive when many were surfing "Stoffers."

I made shore dives off Olowalu on 9/4, 9/5 and 9/7. The weekend of 9/10, 9/11 upper West Side shore dives were all better than OK; Kapalua Bay, Cliff House, Dragon's Teeth, Honolua Bay.

When I was at Maui Dreams renting tanks on the 4th, there were a number of people heading to Maliko Gulch, or talking about their plans to go there the following weekend.

It is fairly rare when shore diving is impossible off an Island.

Pretty sure Black Rock night dives were made between 9/4 and 9/14.

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

I'm diving next week in Maui, staying in a condo on Kaanapali beach.
Hopefully I'll be able to shoredive / freedive right there.

Hey Mark; what is your itinerary? I have you not considering diving Sat the 8th, due to landing the 7th (?) and wanting to dive Sun & Mon (9th and 10th).

 

[Mark Derail]

Hey Mark; what is your itinerary? I have you not considering diving Sat the 8th, due to landing the 7th (?) and wanting to dive Sun & Mon (9th and 10th).

Sent you a PM.

Diving on Saturday not such a great idea. I arrive at the airport at around 6pm. That's Midnight for me. Time to get the rental, drive to Kaanapali and find the condo...it will be like going to bed a 4am.

However, we could do an activity non-diving Saturday night, and we can start Sunday morning very early in the day, as 9am in Hawaii is like 3pm for us.

 

[StuartT]

Hey Mark,
Water temps were 79-80 on all 14 dives. Most boat dives were around the 60 minute run time and the shore dives closer to 90 min. 90 feet was my max depth on one of the Molokini eneuni (sp) drift to the backwall. It was cool to hold on to a rock on the ridge in a bit of current and watch the grey sharks and the whitetips cruising around coming within about 40 feet of us. Vizibility at Molokini was easily 100 feet, dives closer to the South shore was about 50 feet after the swell settled down and at Lanai was about 80 feet. A group of us had planned a dusk then a night dive Sept 11th at Haloa point(white rock beach in South Maui) but the dive was called due to the 4-6 foot swells. There were 3 locals with us that afternoon who agreed that was a good move. The viz would have been not that good anyway.

Thanks for the update Stuart. If you can, give us lots more info on your dives. Times, depth, vis / temp.


I'm diving next week in Maui, staying in a condo on Kaanapali beach.
Hopefully I'll be able to shoredive / freedive right there.

I definitely want to see the catherals, I'm waiting to be onsite before booking anything.

Apparently some whales are in the area too. I'll post my experiences too.

 

[StuartT]

Maybe try Extended Horizons for the Lanai cathedrals as neither me or my 2 buddies were impressed with Lahaina Divers. The owner of Extended was celebrating a birthday the time we wanted to go and weren't running. The dives were great but we did both our dives on our own as the DM pretty well kicked the entire dive even after being asked to slow it down on our suface interval. It was no big deal for us but someone new to diving may have an issue with that. I also just had a look at my log and did get to 100 feet on 2 of the other molokini dives.

Thanks for the update Stuart. If you can, give us lots more info on your dives. Times, depth, vis / temp.


I'm diving next week in Maui, staying in a condo on Kaanapali beach.
Hopefully I'll be able to shoredive / freedive right there.

I definitely want to see the catherals, I'm waiting to be onsite before booking anything.

Apparently some whales are in the area too. I'll post my experiences too.

 

[Shaka Doug]

Hey Mark you should be in store for some great early autumn diving. Water temps are nice and toasty this time of year and we've been having some great conditions this last week. I hope you like Turtles!!

 

[StuartT]

Hey Doug I meant to hook up with you for a night dive just ran out of time. Will see you next time on Island. Nice video of the Honu's by the way.

 

[muddiver]

Nice to see this report. I will be on the Ka'anapali coast in about a week myself. I hope the swell dies down because it is always kind of murky off the beach where I stay. I can't wait to enjoy the 78+ water. I won't know what to do with myself, darn California water nver get above 68 at depth.