Monday in Kauai, November 30, 2015

Martha and Ben went hiking in Waimea Valley, while Megan, Patty and I went scuba diving with Garden Isle Divers.  We met them in Port Allen in Eleele and set out for two dives.  We were the only divers on the boat and chose to be led on both dives by their divemaster.

On both dives, we saw lots of sea life, but much of the coral was bleached out.  The second dive was to an area where there was a turtle cleaning station - a place where fish will eat the algae and other growth off the turtles' shells.  As we arrived, we could see turtles surfacing around the boat.  On previous dives, the turtles would usually leave as soon as divers entered the water - but not here.  There were so many turtles that hung around we could not count them all.  And they were just relaxed, lounging around - they were not trying to evade us divers.  In one case, I had to move out of the way for the turtle to get by me as he came out from under a coral shelf.  And these turtles were huge - many were as long from head to tail as we were from head to toe, and were three to four feet wide as well.

After the dives, we contacted Martha and Ben, and met up with them at Kauai Island Brewery and Grill for some locally brewed beers and a yummy lunch.