Aug. 29, 2016  Kahekili, Kapalua, and another amazing sunset in Lahaina:

I was anxious to get on the road and up to Lahaina to Maui Digital Imagine who advertised online that he specializes in underwater cameras and had a few different models, including the Olympus I was considering, in stock.  We left Kihei about 9.
Gotta add a few more pictures of our drive West!

 close to MM14.  Ken wouldn't snorkel there this trip----something about tiger sharks being aggressive this time of year!

West side mountains.

again somewhere around MM14 --- I love that there's parking for miles all along the highway here.

Found the camera shop---sort of in an out of the way spot.  But that's where the happy news ended!  He said he sold his LAST underwater camera earlier this morning!  Really?!  I mentioned he had several listed as in stock.  To which he said he needed to update his website.  That would have been nice!  Maybe I'll move here and open a camera shop!
So we continued on to Kahekili.  It was already a bit rough and the current was running to the south this time.  But we spent about 1 1/2 hours there.
Heading in---

 Waiting for Ken

 a yellow tail coris

 blue goatfish

 lots of schools again.

 First hogfish I've seen here---or this trip, for that matter.

 lizardfish

longnose butterflyfish

 part of a school of black triggerfish

 threadfin butterflyfish

 another school

 a large ring tail wrasse

 bullethead parrotfish-female

 not a great picture, but a rare find---an adolescent ring tail wrasse.

 the only turtle we saw today.

 juvenile pale tail unicorn fish

 a generic view of the reef here.

 a scorpion fish---another rare find

 star eye parrotfish

 male bullethead parrotfish

 The current was getting pretty strong, so we decided to head to Kapalua.  figured it would be calmer, and it was.

 waiting for Ken, again.

 Ornate butterflyfish

   not too many racoon butterflyfish around Maui. 

 a big puffer fish

 a cigar wrasse-female ---another rather rare find.

 4 spot butterflyfish

 another kind of pufferfish

 a large eel.

 generic coral at Kapalua.

A whitemouth moray eel.

 I figure he stirred something up that it wanted and shot up towards me.  First time I've seen one swim upward like that!

 wish I had a better camera, these fan tailed triggerfish as so colorful.

 a colorful stocky hawkfish

 black side hawkfish

 female old woman wrasse.

 another not very good photo, but the little yellow guy to the left is another endemic Hawaiian fish---a milletseed butterflyfish.  This was the first one I've seen this trip.

 another stocky hawkfish

 After another couple hours we decided it was time to go.  By now it was about 4:30.  We decided to head to Lahaina again.  We like Peggy Sue's so much that we decided to go to the diner in Lahaina---Cool Cats---which is right across the street from the big banyon tree.
We even had a coupon for a free root beer float.  It had been a long time since I had one.  It was as good as I remembered!

 Looking down the street from our table.  The restaurant was a little hard to figure out how to get to.  It's on the 2nd floor, but the elevator and steps were in the back of the complex. 

 My blackened fish sandwich.  Think it was about $14. 

 Ken's chicken sandwich.  I don't think he liked it as much as the one at Peggy Sue's.

 After we ate we headed across the street to check out the banyon tree. 

 Amazing it has gotten so big!

 the courthouse --- looked like renos were being done on the other side.  Not sure it's still the court house, but that's what it says on it.  (I'm told this is open to the public and has some fun displays.  The views from the 2nd floor are great.  The newer courthouse in Lahaina isn't nearly as pretty.) 

 Another thing that amazed me about the tree was all the birds that were in it.  They made quite a racket!  This is all one tree!

 Headed over to the marina for sunset.

 Also checked out the remnants of the old fort made of coral between the banyon tree and the marina.

 We ended up sitting at the boat dock for the ferry.  This is looking back into the marina.

 It was another fabulous sunset!  The 3 times we've been in Lahaina for sunset we had spectacular sunsets.  Very colorful and long lasting.  I'm beginning to think Lahaina always has great sunsets!

 I even liked the reflection of the sky in the water.

 Looking back towards the street.

 yes, it was that vibrant!  No photo editing here!

 We sat and watched the sunset for a good 30-40 minutes.  Then walked back to the car.  Such a cute little bustling beach town!

 another historic building

 I believe this was a Wyland creation.  An interesting light.

  Where we dined earlier---above the Wharf sign.

 Traffic even went a lot better after sunset.  Got back to the condo, but still have about 3,500 steps to do---which I did.  Made for a late start on my blog for today.