Two diving days in Kona - what to do?

[Tunaman68]

Hi there,

The family will be doing our yearly trek to HI this summer (end of June), but we're adding 4 days on the Big Island to the schedule. We want to take a day and see the the volcano (is that an altitude problem after diving like it is on Maui?), and will need 24 hrs before our inter island flight.

We're looking at staying at the Waikoloa beach Marriot, but could stay elsewhere if being closer to Honokohau harbor is a plus.

If you Kona experts only had two days to dive, what areas/sites and dive op would you say are must do's? We could do shore or boat dives, and are for SURE doing the manta night dive. We'll be hauling all our gear except tanks and weights so would need to rent those items for any shore diving.

My daughter and I are experienced divers, and have done many dives in Maui/Lanai/Molokini, Kauai, California, and just came back from a week of dive madness in Cozumel. We're up for 4 dives a day. We like reef, fish, and are really into caves, tubes, and swim throughs - varied topo with good formations and drop offs are always nice as well! We're not photographers, so not really interested in macro. We prefer small boats, and both are good with our air so would like to be able to dive our tanks.

Hope this will give everyone a good idea of what to suggest - looking forward to your feedback!

Thanks in advance!

 

[friscuba]

For shore diving for somewhat experienced (not difficult entries by any means, just gotta know when to pass) shore divers, Puako is about 15 minutes to the north of you. It's a one road coastal town with public access every 5-10 houses, pick a flat spot and you'll love it, if the surf's up a hair (it's got about 50 yards of shallow water to the dropoff, even 18 inch swell can knock you around a bit), check the next access point, several access points face slightly different directions so something's probably flat. The Place of Refuge, more like 75 minutes to the south of you, is great shore diving for all levels of skill with easy entry.

While the manta dive is awesome and pretty much a must, there's tons of good diving in Kona, some of the best in the state, by both shore and boat. Most operators are going to try to get you to the best available spots at the time, it's tough to plan dives in advance and you'll find lots of the boats have no real spot picked out 'til they're outside the harbor mouth and can check on conditions, see what's available and find something that works for all of their customers.

If you're looking for a small boat that lets you dive your air, do check out my op. We do lots of 75-90 minute dives when we have divers that are good on air. We dive computer profiles and drop people off at the mooring line as they reach 500 psi and continue exploring with those that have more air left. The afternoon/evening manta dive is timed though. Most everyone is in the 50-60 minute range on that one. Bottom times can vary from op to op so it's good to check on bottom time policies if you're good on air.

The volcano park entrance is around 4000-4500 feet in elevation, I personally can't recommend going there the same day as diving, the day after should be OK in most situations. If you're loading up and doing lots of dives in a day, it wouldn't hurt to check out the NOAA elevation after diving tables.

Have fun!

 

[Maine Diver]

I just returned from 2 weeks of diving with Kona Diving Company. I was allowed to dive my own prfile which was mostly in the 1:15-1:30 range. If you can, book the long range day. Great op, great owner, and great dive guides. I was made to feel like family. I loved every single site they took me to. We had dolphins, turtles, mantas during the day, sharks, a hammerhead, a stingray, tons of fish, and whale sightings on every boat ride. I even got to hear the whales singing. I lik ethat their boat is moored right in the harbor, just walk right on in the morning. They took care of all the equipment. It's the closest I have ever seen to a liveaboard on a day boat. Hope this helps.

 

[TSandM]

Be aware that the manta "dive" is a bit different -- Basically, a whole group of boats converge on the site, you get in the water and swim to a very shallow place where you are to sit on the bottom (hopefully not on the coral) and wait for the mantas. On our particular night, we saw none, but we did have a good time with the night dive part, going back to the boat.

I would recommend one of the black water dives. Again, a bit different, because you are tethered to the boat and hanging over 6000 feet of water, but I thoroughly enjoyed the 45 minutes I spent watching the extremely strange deep ocean animals swirling by.

 

[pjhansman]

We like reef, fish, and are really into caves, tubes, and swim throughs - varied topo with good formations and drop offs are always nice as well! We're not photographers, so not really interested in macro. We prefer small boats, and both are good with our air so would like to be able to dive our tanks.

Looking forward to the trip report Tom....

We're planning the same trip for Xmas this year, so I expect lots of details

 

[Tunaman68]

Be aware that the manta "dive" is a bit different -- Basically, a whole group of boats converge on the site, you get in the water and swim to a very shallow place where you are to sit on the bottom (hopefully not on the coral) and wait for the mantas. On our particular night, we saw none, but we did have a good time with the night dive part, going back to the boat.

My wife and I did this dive on our honeymoon when it was out in front of the Kona surf hotel. It was just the two of us and a DM with about 10 rays. We went to the rocky bottom and wedged ourselves in and turned on some big dive lights and hung out! Alas I realize it's not like this any more!

Thanks for the suggestions so far - keep em coming! Phil - can't wait, I'll try to get the 411 for you guys - we're going back to BA for the same Nov trip, guess you won't be there!?!?!?!

 

[Doubler]

We did the Manta Dive in August off the airport. Had 25 to 30 Manta's and it was great.
I really don't get the allure of the night "Bait Dive" not being a big fan of Oceanic Whitetips, but that's just me. Yeah you will see some strange deep water creatures but you could also be dangling on a hook at forty feet for some "curious" toothy critters with attitude.

 

[pjhansman]

Phil - can't wait, I'll try to get the 411 for you guys - we're going back to BA for the same Nov trip, guess you won't be there!?!?!?!

One never knows.....it very much depends on my lovely wife.

Personally, I'd love to join you

 

[BSOD]

I was there a few weeks ago, and gotta second the caution about going to the volcanoes after diving. The way I did it was I went up Mauna Kea before I started diving, since that's 13+k feet. Then after a few 2-4 tank days, I went to Waimea at 2500' 24hrs after my last dive, and still got a little tingly (could've been psychosomatic/in my head) - went right back down to sea level though and was fine. Ended up visiting Kilauea the next day.

Also, if you're only diving two days, I'd suggest booking a manta dive for both, in case you get skunked on the first one - I got skunked one my first one, and "only" one manta on the second one (though she stayed around for a while and put on quite the show).

 

[TracysaCADiver]

I'm going to make this one short and sweet, since there's been a lot of good suggestions... I've heard Jack's Diving Locker is a good operation as well.

Kona's definately on me bucket list.