Hey! Lookit all mai new fishfrenz!
Kahaluu Beach Park Snorkeling Secrets! The Complete Guide to Big Island Snorkeling!
Kahaluu Beach Park is a tiny sheltered cove on the west side of the Big Island right in the town of Kailua Kona. It’s one of only a handful of beaches in Hawaii with such a large tame fish population. Kahaluu Beach is not a marine preserve, yet for having no fishing limitations, it rivals and sometimes surpasses the quantity of fish you’ll see at a dedicated marine sanctuary.
We’re on the Big Island, so we’re now On Hawaii In Hawaii.
We got in to our condo yesterday evening after what seemed like a long day of slogging through airport car rental return, security, waiting, and flying in a noisy Dash-8 prop from Kaua’i to Maui and finally to Kona-Kailua. After a couple of false starts we found the big, well-stocked Safeway’s, which was well hidden up the hill from the Borders bookstore on the main highway, and loaded up with what we hope is a week’s worth of food, drink, and snacks.
After dinner, we went for a walk around the complex and got really lost. We also got lost just getting out of here this morning, and lost again trying to find our way back to our building. I think this is going to be a recurring theme, as the property here is quite large, with many identical looking two and three story buildings, lush landscaping, and covered parking structures scattered all over. We’ll probably get the hang of it just before returning home.
We arrived just as the sun was setting – lovely, but we missed the best part of it while getting checked in. The complex here at Kanaloa seems aimed more at the golf and tennis set than anything else, and after specifying something “not ground floor” we ended up with a large two-bedroom, two-level unit that is itself up two flights of stairs from the ground floor. And the master bedroom is up another flight of stairs, so you can imagine how knackered we were after dragging all the luggage up from the car and then getting it up 2 flights to the living room. This time, unlike on Kaua’i, we had our traditional “cold luau” supper, with two kinds of poke (tuna and smoked aku along with lomi salmon and poi) and enjoyed a bottle of cold Kona Brewing Company beer (I think it’s Longboard Ale, could be wrong). We’ve also got stuff to do burgers again, and some nice tuna to grill, along with stuff for a couple of lunches plus at least one cooked breakfast. We’re set – and if we get stuck for breakfast or lunch, there’s a poolside restaurant here that’s got good coffee (and even seem to be set up for cocktails in the afternoon, although they’re only open until 3pm).
We actually, finally, got wet this morning, after not going in the water at all in Kaua’i. We went to a nearby beach park and I tried out the rented, vision-correcting mask, which worked all right (although the snorkel tube literally sucks). I’m using the older small digital camera with the underwater housing David used to use, as he has a newer small camera and housing. I took a few pictures just to try it out, and will be interested to see how images come out. David’s got my camera pre-set for underwater use when the seletion wheel is set to “SCENE.” It even comes up and says “Underwater” when I thumb the menu button to get it the LCD screen to show the current image.
We had a reasonably-priced breakfast (a first for Hawaii) at the poolside restaurant here at the complex, because when we were done with snorkeling back at the beach park, I asked the lifeguard and some older guy that was talking to him about breakfast spots, and they all answered “Denny’s!” Meh with that, we came back here to shower properly, with soap and all nekky, and then had a decent meal.
Earlier, before departing for the snorkel site, we had a call from our friend Steve, who very very kindly shoveled our drive (partly) and the front walk up to the door to make our house look lived in. While he was there, we could hear Riley meowing vociferously and told Steve where the webcam was. Sure enough, when we went to the webcam link there were Steve’s feet and the bottom of his long winter parka, and Riley’s image showed he was twining around Steve’s legs. This is heroic of Steve, because he’s actually allergic to cats, although he’s always willing to come in and check on David’s computers. Steve reports all well with tech stuff, and the basement is dry, and the cat is reasonably happy. So it’s all good.
After a short amount of relax time, we’ll head back out to snork a bit more, this time at the Place of Refuge (Honaunau) where there’s reportedly more clearance. Where we were (Kahaulepu?) it was easy entry, but very shallow although there were plenty of fish.
Our unit has a deep soaking tub with Jacuzzi jets and I might avail myself of that later for our second relax session, timed for after this next snorkel. For dinner, not sure if we’ll go out or grill the tuna; we might be eating in more this week than we did last week.
With all the stairs in this place, I expect to be in great shape by the end of the week!
Here’s a link to an article that explains the name of this place a little more.
Kanaloa – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Kanaloa is one of the four great gods of Hawaiian mythology, along with KÄne, KÅ«, and Lono. He is the local form of a Polynesian deity generally connected with the sea. Roughly equivalent deities are known as Tangaroa in Aotearoa, Tagaloa in SÄmoa, Tangaloa in Tonga, and TaÊ»aroa in Tahiti.
