My last Chance

Posted on February 20, 2017February 20, 2017 by Dusty Roads | 4 Comments

It was Friday. My last day on Maui. My last chance for that elusive photo. I’ve had a lot of fun on my whirlwind visit but I still don’t have that Breaching whale photo.

Photo By Anna Smith

I’ve got one more chance. My plane isn’t leaving until 6:30 pm so I have time for 1 more whale watch.

This time I switched my approach. The 3 previous whale watches were on good sized catamarans. Maybe the boats were intimidating the whales. We can’t chase or encroach on the animals. The boats can’t approach closer than 100 yards. Now that doesn’t prevent the huge mammals from coming close to the boats but that means we are leaving it up to the animals.

Whales Nose

On one of the previous whale watching trips I’d spotted a tiny little boat that seemed to be attracting lots of attention from the whales. They were blowing and flipper slapping all around it. It was a pontoon raft style boat.

Ocean Raft

I found a flyer for Ocean Rafting and made sure I tracked them down in Lahaina Harbor. I got a spot on the 10 am trip.

Lahaina Booths

I had a death grip on the captain as I stepped onto the pontoon to the boat. We had bench seats to start out. Once out of the harbor we could move to the pontoons if we so choose. Standing up was also ok.

All Aboard

Man O War

Right away we saw action and the whales did come closer to the boat. Mostly we were looking at the wide backs as they cruised along with us.

whale back

It was a hazy day. Not the bright , sunny days we’d been having but the seas weren’t too rough. We did get splashed a few times as we flew over the water .

Humpback

At one point a whale dove right in front of us. The captain brought us up to a stop and killed the engine. We all held our breaths and listened. We could hear the whale song without any magnification! The captain said we were right above the whale that was doing the singing. They tossed in a hydrophone which brought in the whale song loud and clear. It was much cleaner than the one from yesterday, probably because we were so close we were just picking up the one whale.

Another Tail

As we passed the Queen Elizabeth, a cruise ship in Lahaina Harbor, we saw a mom and calf. The Mom dove giving us a nice shot of her flukes.

Cuise ship sighting

It was another successful whale search but still no breaches. The Captain said the whales breach every day but as I mentioned in the beginning, you just have to be in the right place at the right time. Unlike trained whales at Sea World, they don’t jump on command.

Pectoral fin glows emerald through the water as this whale swims beside out raft

Pectoral fin glows emerald through the water as this whale swims beside our raft

I guess that means I’ll have to go back next season!

Whale Watch #3

Posted on February 19, 2017February 19, 2017 by Dusty Roads | 2 Comments

Thursday I awoke to a real cacophony from the hundreds of birds perched along the roof line, most appeared to be Myna birds. It was amazing the volume of their chirps and calls. I hesitate to use the term “song”. I stuck my phone out the slider and pressed record. I was sure no one would believe it without proof. (I haven’t figured out how to get the recording from my phone to this page, Any ideas techies?)

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Both whale watches from Wednesday had been fun and successful as far as seeing whales but I still didn’t get the photo I was seeking. I consoled myself that even National Geographic photographers sometimes had to wait weeks to get that special picture. If it was easy everyone would do it!

I still had the whale watch coming to me for becoming a member of the Pacific Whale Foundation so I headed back down to their shop to see if they had any open spots. I was seeing whales breaching all around me on every trip, just too far away. It’s just a matter of being in the right place at the right time and that means getting back out there.

Pacific Whale Foundation

Luckily they had an opening on the 2 pm whale watch on the catamaran Ocean Intrigue.

Ocean Intriguw

I had high hopes for this trip as it was active almost as soon as we took off. We saw a female with two male whales chasing her around. There was a lot of tail slapping and flipper waving. Everyone on board got very excited.

Whale Chase

At times it looked like the whales were climbing right over each other. But no breaching.

flipper slap

Whales Nose

We moved on to a mother and calf. The calf was very excited by our approach and began slapping the surface with his little tail. It was like he was standing on his head and slapping his tail back and forth.

Baby Humpback

So much splashing, So much energy but no breach.

Whale of a Tail

As the action slowed a bit a hydrophone was dropped over the side. We could hear many different whales as they sang their songs. The naturalist said it was probably about a 25 mile radius.

Mom and Calf

Finally it was time to head back into shore. We passed the 3 whales from the start of the trip and they were still going strong with their chasing and competing. The whales had been closer to the boat this time and certainly we saw some fun behaviors but still no breaching. My time was running out.

Dive

Pride of Maui

Posted on February 18, 2017February 18, 2017 by Dusty Roads | 2 Comments

The Pride of Maui was my afternoon whale watch. I was surprised to find that I was really tired even before we headed out. This fun in the sun can really knock the wind out of your sails!

The morning whale watch had returned around 11 am so I had plenty of time to get a snack. I didn’t want to eat too much because this trip included lunch and a snorkel stop.

Maalaea Harbor

The way I felt as I waited for the Pride of Maui to return from their morning excursion I was seriously doubting I was going to go snorkeling. Still I had my bathing suit on so I figured I could make that decision when the time came.

The “Pride” was another catamaran but much larger than the one we were on for the morning trip. Reef safe sunscreen was being passed around. It was really thick and everyone was coated in white. It reminded me of the zinc oxide ointment the life guards used to put on their noses when I was a kid.

Finally the ship was in, the morning tour unloaded and we began to move up the gangway.

Although this was billed as a whale watch, and we certainly saw whales, it felt as if the emphasis was on the snorkeling part of the trip.

We stopped at a place along the shore that the crew referred to Coral Gardens. It wasn’t that far south of the lookout. I spotted the tunnel on Rt 30. We were given our gear and instructions. There was 1 hour set aside for the snorkel part of the trip. While everyone was in the water the crew fired up grills and began cooking hot dogs, hamburgers and grilled chicken. Quite a feast considering it was all done on the boat.

I did decide to go snorkeling. I thought the cold water might perk me up. I’m glad I did too. I saw a tiny little, yellow pipefish and while I was watching it a brown blob that I thought was a stone started to move. It was a tiny little octopus! It was really fun watching that little guy and I followed him for a good portion of my snorkel time. The parrot fish and yellow butterfly fish that we always saw around were everywhere but that octopus was the high point for me.

Back on board we were just casting off after the nice lunch when we were surrounded by a pod of spinner dolphins. What a great way to wrap up our day.

By the way, this was a 3 hour tour. Remember Gilligan’s Island? They went on a 3 hour tour too but we came back!

I’m Alive!

Posted on February 13, 2017February 13, 2017 by Dusty Roads | 2 Comments

Well as you can see from the title I not only survived the nose to nose standoff, I managed to come back down the mountain side and get back to the safe driving.

The first car would not give an inch. I climbed a boulder to get as far off the road as I could. Finally the car I was facing gunned the engine and shot past me. My car immediately slid of the rock and settled back onto the road but there was still one more car that had refused to back up.

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With much arm waving and shouting the spectators finally got him off to the side of the road so I could just squeak past. I didn’t dare look at the drop off to my left or I’m sure I would have fainted dead away.

Having passed that obstacle I finished my drive to the top where I found a food truck with a small parking area. There were lots of cars parked and everyone was milling around. I pulled in too. It seemed as good a place as any to bring my heart rate back down to something close to normal.

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I made up my mind that I was not leaving that parking area unless it was to go back the way I came. I’d had quite enough of the Road to Hana. I didn’t care that I hadn’t found the park I was looking for. Another time maybe.

It was almost 30 minutes before we saw cars beginning to climb the road on the opposite hill. Everyone ran for their cars including me. I tacked onto the end of the little caravan. But about 100 yards down we came to a stop. Finally a man came back to tell us all to back up. As the last in line I was the first to start to back up.

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Still shaken from the first experience I wasn’t doing too good a job so our traffic director hopped in and had me back in the parking area in short order. It was obvious that he had a lot of experience backing up. Another 20-30 minute wait and we all started down again. This time he had the upcoming cars pulled over and our line of about 15 cars all managed to pass without incident. I was the last one and I watched the cars head on up the road once I had passed by.

The Road to Hana is beautiful but as I learned the hard way, also dangerous and treacherous. I don’t want to do a repeat of this anytime soon!

The Road to Hana Revisited

Posted on February 12, 2017February 12, 2017 by Dusty Roads | 8 Comments

What a gorgeous morning. It was quite windy but it was warm and the sky was a brilliant blue with white cloud accents. It seemed as if the storm that started my day had passed through.

I’d spotted at least 3 whales from shore so that bodes well for the boat trip on Wednesday. My UTI was either gone or in check for now so all was right with my world.

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I continued driving on RT 30. Eventually it would turn into the notorious Road to Hana, one of the top 10 deadliest roads in the world. Sandy and I drove part of it in the rain our first day in Maui in November. We then took the tour that drove us the whole way. I was willing to do the first section because that didn’t seem too bad but not the rest. Today I was just looking for the park where we saw the beautiful surf and the rainbow.

I didn’t remember it being too far out and it was a two lane road there.

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I was stopping often to take pictures. I was seeing things I hadn’t been able to see from the tour bus or notice in the rain. It was just beautiful. I also think it was much more green than when we were there in November. Probably because of all the rain in Maui’s winter. I was really intent on what I was doing and lost track of mile markers. The resort said not to go past mile marker 38.

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Suddenly I was looking at a long downhill stretch that was one lane. OOPS! I think I went too far. I could see a line of cars stopped that were going in the same direction I was . No place to turn around either. So taking a deep breath I eased forward.

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This section wasn’t too bad and I didn’t meet any cars coming up. Probably due to the traffic jam ahead of me. I crossed the one lane bridge and started the climb up where I’d seen the cars stopped. I had a whole line of cars behind me when, close to the top, another car rounded a blind corner and we were nose to nose on one lane. A cliff face to my right and a deadly drop off to my left. Somebody was going to have to back up!

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