Aug. 21, 2016 === Snorkel, snorkel, snorkel!

Today we're off to the West side!  Love the mountain views along the way!  Really curious about the road up to the windmills!  I sure wouldn't want to be in a vehicle on that slope!

 More views of the cloud shrouded mountains.

A tunnel of trees along the highway.

Finally at our destination.  Love the colorful trash can on the parking lot.

I'd read lots about how great Kahekili beach snorkeling is, so decided we should try it.  Guess I should have done a little more research!  Turns out we went to Slaughterhouse Beach.

Oh well, we weren't the only ones there and we had an enjoyable snorkel.

 There was even a snorkel tour there.  After having been here, I'd have been disappointed if I paid for a snorkel trip there.  It is part of Honolua Reserve, but doesn't look anything like the underwater terrain of Honolua Bay.

 a male surge wrasse greeted us.  We don't see a lot of these wrasses around Maui. 

 a bonefish

 a pearl wrasse

 male bird wrasse

 unicorn fish

 ornate butterflyfish

 I don't remember seeing this kind of wrasse before.  Will have to look it up later.

 leather back Jack

 some large blue trevellis

 a blue stripe snapper.

 We tired quickly of the area by the snorkel cruise and decided to go around the point and into Honolua Bay.  As soon as we made the turn, we saw this ball of fish.

we continued on around the bay to the other side where the coral heads are great.  Came across another even bigger school of fish over there.  This was about 1/5 of them.

 There were a lot of areas in the water where fresh water was getting in and messing up vision and making it colder.  But it was pretty clear.  Love all the markings you can see on the black triggerfish when the water is so clear!

We had just gotten to the huge coral heads and my camera battery died!  Lesson learned----don't charge your camera on a lap top because it won't charge when the computer is not in use!  We still spent about 3 hours snorkeling around the 2 bays.
After climbing back out of Slaughterhouse Beach, we went to the over look of Honolua Bay.  Quite a swim from Slaughterhouse to the far side of Honolua Bay---especially when you're hugging the border.  We ended up swimming straight across on the way back---as 2 tour groups arrived.

 This is the entryway from Honolua Bay.  Ken won't enter the water from the rocks, so we swam over instead from Slaughterhouse Bay instead.

 So where do you go when you're hungry and need an electrical socket???  McDonald's!  At least I had the charger with me.  So we had a burger and rested in the ac for a bit before heading to our next snorkel beach---Kapalua. 

 The water wasn't as clear here, but did get a lot clearer way out by the point.  Here we were greeted by 2 teardrop butterflyfish.

 a lei triggerfish

 moray eel

At first I thought these were lei triggerfish, too, but I've not seen any that looked like this before.

 sailfin tangs sailing along

 looking towards the beach from out by the point.

long nose butterflyfish

 a threadfin butterflyfish and brown surgeonfish

 a rather large arc eye hawkfish

 short nosed wrasse and a yellow tail coris

a moorish idol

 saddle wrasse

 pale nose unitcorn fish

 close up of the beautiful short nosed wrasse

 stocky hawkfish

 orange spine unicorn fish

 even as far out as we were, there was a paddle boarder out even farther.

 heading back in

 blue stripe butterflyfish

 fantail filefish

 a trumpet fish

 4 spot

 stripe belly puffer

 After another couple hours, we had had enough for one day.  So we showered by the beach and changed clothes in the bathroom.
Loved these flowering trees that were everywhere around Maui!  so pretty!  Someone told me they're called a Rainbow tree.

We headed to Lahaina for dinner.  Lots of great views of the ocean along the way!

 Love the little Beach Town of Lahaina!

 our ride for the week.  so far so good!

I had the brilliant idea to eat on a patio overlooking the ocean.  So we ended up at Kimo's for dinner.  My idea had a few problems---like as the sun was setting, it was shining in my eyes.  Ended up sitting facing the wall most of the time!  Little more expensive then I expected ($80 for the 2 of us without drinks), but the food was really good.  I got the opa fish dinner----ono!!!! 

 Ken got the lobster topped mahi and said he liked it.

 I ran out of there just before sunset and walked back up to the walkway by the ocean. 

Idiot

 Fortunately we had a long, beautiful sunset so I had lots of opportunities to take more sunset photos.

With the colors gone, we headed back to the car.  Lahaina sure is a hopping little town.

 Just having lived in Florida, the alligator skull in a store caught my eye. 

 Then this carved shell caught my eye.

 This nautilus one really caught my eye!

 Lots of galleries along the way, too.  This interesting artwork was in one of the gallery windows. 

Got back to the condo about 9---over 12 hours after we left this morning.  Fun, busy day!