We arrive at the marina early, as usual, and hang out in the plaza waiting for our 4:30 sailing. To our surprise, there are only 16 people on the boat. That’s crazy! Good for us – lots more room to move around and see things, but wow – we were really surprised.
It’s really windy again today, so I took my sea sick pill early – I’m not taking any chances. I knew going in that it can be choppy – Ma’alaea harbor is the 2nd windiest harbor in the world – so I’m prepared, but its still pretty wicked out there in the open.
We all board and set off down the coastline. Within minutes we’ve spotted a baby and mama playing in the water. It’s so cute to watch the baby’s little tail come up and slap the water, then the mama surfacing. We stay alongside for about 20 minutes enjoying the show – and not taking pictures because it is so windy I can barely stand up and there’s no way I’d get a good picture trying to balance and hold the phone. Oh, and the wine. I ended up having to hold the wine cup between my feet just to make sure it stayed put and didn’t splash all over me. As we were leaving I did manage to get one shot of the tail in the distance, and a good picture of Ed though.
The whales are really active tonight – we can see blows all over the place. Most are too far off to get to, but it is still cool to watch them out in the distance.
As we head toward the coast of Lahaina, we get some awesome views of the West Maui mountains and the Ukumehame Valley.
Then we find more whales. Really close to the boat too. And here is where the new phone/camera/operator error comes in. I’m not yet used to the phone, so I’m not 100% comfortable with holding it and taking photos. As you will see from the wonderful photos below that feature my hand – oh and that whale’s tail and the humpback and all the other photos I ruined. Sigh. To my defense, it was still so windy out there, I was worried about losing my phone to the ocean…but…still…..
I did manage to crop the tail photo for a little better look. But to say I was disappointed would be a huge understatement.
The photos got a little better with the next whales we saw, quite close to the boat as well….
After the last sighting, we have our dinner – Kalua pork, chicken, rice, beans (we didn’t eat that), chips and fruit. The sunset whale watch is great for this – food, beer, wine, sunset and whales. What more could you want? Music? Oh, yes, music too – with a local artist who sang Hawaiian songs all night.
Perfect!
And as a side note, one of the naturalists with us graduated from University of Colorado. What a coincidence – you hardly ever meet CU grads, especially on the water. It was fun chatting with her a bit as we ate our dinner/snacks.
As we sailed back into the harbor, the musician, Eric Gilliom, came through the cabin and gave us all a CD he had made with some of his original songs. So nice. And then, as we disembarked, we were handed home made warm brownies. Yes. The brownies! I was waiting for them. LOL.
No need for more food tonight, so we head back to the condo to enjoy the rest of our evening.
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