Favorite photos from Hawaii

[Kristy]

All right, although much overdue, we have sifted through our hundreds of photos from our trip to Hawaii (Oahu) and have some we thought you guys would enjoy seeing.
8462846184608459
8458

[Mr Cob]

Beautiful! Awesome shots!

The one of sandy beach brings back shore breaking, neck pounding memories! That was a fun surf spot when the adrenaline was rushing. Couldn't do it often though.

Here's how crazy this wave gets:
http://www.surfboardshack.com/images/breaks/sandys_01.jpg


more info about it:
http://www.surfboardshack.com/oahu-surf-spots_sandy-beach.html

[Europhyllia]

okay surely you have more than 5 favorite pictures, right?

[Mr Cob]

Another shot of Sandy Beach:
http://ih3.redbubble.net/work.761496.7.flat,550x550,075,f.shorebreak-sandy-beach-oahu.jpg

Did Mike sample it out?

[RayAllen]

Great pictures. But where are the fish pics! No snorkeling or anything?

[Kristy]

8467846684658464
8463
I was able to snorkel every weekend (nine weekends!) and almost every time ran into a sea turtle which is an exhilarating experience. Only once or twice did I have the uderwater camera ready and capture the moment.

[Kristy]

I'm downloading as fast as I can... :)!

[Europhyllia]

If you need help picking some out, here's what I want to see:
- a shot of you and Mike looking happy in Hawaii
- sea turtles
- you petting a sea turtle underwater
- anthias
- more anthias
- other fish
- more fish
- some nice night or sunset scene
- a LFS

Thanks in advance ;)

PS: the waves do look scary! Do a lot of tourists drown there?

[Mr Cob]

I love the sea turtle shots! I can see some sponges too!

[RayAllen]

Awesome turtle pics!

Karin from my understanding it is surf/swim at your own risk in all areas. Just like anywhere else, id hope someone would be bright enough not to swim in those waves unless you are experienced with those conditions. Not all beaches in Hawaii get the huge waves so there are plenty of family friendly locations where you wouldnt have to worry about things like a huge wave drowning your family members.

Its not the waves you worry about its the jagged coral and rocks underneath that are the killers.

[Kristy]

84728471847084698468
Taking photos underwater is SO HARD! Some days the visibility is better than others, but mostly the problem was that I would get so engrossed in swimming around and glimpsing a certain fish that I would forget to photograph it. There were times I had to almost choose between SEEING the snorkeling sights or photographing them.

[Mr Cob]

That urchin shot is insane!

[RayAllen]

You got to see several tang species up close. The 2nd pic looks to be a puffer. Great stuff Kristy.

[Kristy]

84778476847584748473
I am having the hardest time deciding what to include and what to leave out. Just a few more...!

[sampsonndelila]

I did 22 dives around that Island. Awesome clarity and variety of sea life!

[Europhyllia]

what's the blob (picture 3?)
love the urchins and sponges pic! :)

[Kristy]

That blob (pic #3) is a sea cucumber. They were everywhere but were not very easy to make out at first glance sometimes. Mike and I both noticed them first by recognizing the little sandy poo pellets that they excrete. Once you recognize them, you start seeing them all over the place!

Still uploading more, had a little glitch that slowed me down.

[Kristy]

84828481848084798478
So many butterfly fish (several different types) and triggerfish everywhere! That last pic is a spaghetti worm reaching out from the rocks.

[Kristy]

84878486848584848483
Mike and I loved exploring the many tidepools along the beaches. Some of them were pretty treacherous climbs to reach, like the one we nicknamed "Razorblade Beach" and still have the scars on our calves as souvenirs!

If you look closely in those sandy photos, you should see rockskipping blennies. I had to be really quick to capture their photo before they went leaping to another tidepool. They could cover some serious ground in a split second, skipping right over rocks with no water for ten feet until they got to the next tide pool. Helps me understand why some blenny species are such dedicated carpet surfers in our homes.

[Kristy]

84928491849084898488
That first photo is of one of the beaches where we found these tidepools (the less treacherous beach... Razorblade Beach was right up the road).

[Kristy]

84978496849584948493
For the full ambiance on those palm tree photos, you have to imagine that I have just had an evening swim in a lagoon at the end of a long day of work and am enjoying the best mai tai on the island at my favorite tiki bar...

[Europhyllia]

the cool purple water armadillo... what is it?

[Kristy]

85028501850084998498

[Kristy]

the cool purple water armadillo... what is it?

I thought that it was a funky sea urchin but then saw a similar one in a photo described as a sea star, so I'm still not positive.

[Kristy]

8509850885078506
Some of the coolest sights in Hawaii were just walking down the sidewalk, crossing a bridge near the shoreline and look down to see tangs, puffers, butterflyfish, pipefish, urchins, crabs, corals... all hanging out and growing along the manmade cement dock area. The visibility was much better than it looks in these photos, due to the moving water surface. The pics don't do it justice but you get the idea.

[Europhyllia]

can't be a sea star. had a quick look on the net and voila:
Colobocentrotus atratus
http://www.marinelifephotography.com/marine/echinoderms/urchins/urchins.htm
That is way cool.
Wasn't Allan thinking of a tidal tank? Maybe a tidal urchin tank?

[Kristy]

85148513851285118510

All right Karin, had to go into the dozens more photos on my iPhone in order to complete your list. The bartletts photo is from the LFS - and I would have to do a dedicated thread on their LFS alone, but I will tell you that there were over 300 bartletts there that day... totally different than anything I've ever experienced anywhere else in the world. There are no anthias photos from snorkeling, etc. because anthias are almost all deeper water fish (one of the reasons they tend to be more expensive as there is a bit more involved in their collection) although every once in a while you hear a story about a wayward anthias in more shallow waters.

No collection of Hawaii photos is complete without a rainbow photo, so I included my favorite - not because of the quality of the pic, but because it was the view outside my apartment window on Easter morning. There is also a photos of a Buddhist Temple (Byodo In Temple) that I loved and then me smiling with a lei. Can't really offer one of Mike and I together in paradise because I was sick as a dog most of the time Mike was visiting but still dragging myself to work. There were lots of things I had hoped Mike and I would get to explore together that he ended up exploring alone during his visit and I checked out later when I was feeling better.

[Kristy]

Wow... I wish my photos looked as good as those on the website!

I won't post any more photos, I promise! None of the photos really do the views justice anyway.
But I will tell you about some of the stuff we saw that we didn't catch on film:
schools of hundreds of convict tangs
schools of hundreds of yellow eye kole tangs
schools of hundreds of black triggers
sailfin tangs around 24"
Naso tangs over 20" long just swimming along with me with both scalpel blades pointing my direction!
sea turtle being cleaned by five or six yellow eye kole tangs
huge moray eel swimming under me about 1.5 feet below
dragon wrasse (in the photos above but terrible pic) that still had juvenile markings but 7 - 8" long
school of maybe 200 jacks (in the photos above but even worse pic) that move together in swirling shapes
pipefish 18" long
beautiful encrusting coral all around (all those lavenders that you guys are thinking are sponge are encrusting coral)
tiny reef fish darting, peeking out of corals

[roscozman]

Very cool.

[Mr Cob]

What an amazing trip Mike and Kristy!

[txav8r]

Man, I really want to go back now!

[alton]

I am jealous, thanks for the pictures

[Kristy]

Man, I really want to go back now!

Yeah, me too actually!

[roscozman]

Man, I really want to go back now!

Come on Jack... we going in Sept.

[ErikH]

Did the schools of Jacks have a Bud Light in their fins? LOL

Those pics are amazing. When we SNUBAd in Roatan, we saw lots of fish, but not as many that I could rattle off the names of like I could in your pics. I would never leave, you would have to pry the sand from my cold dead hands.

[Kristy]

Ha Erik, no Bud Light cans, but the jacks were really odd to run into because until we were right up on them, it really does look like there is an 8' fish swimming nearby, most deceptive! Then when we got closer, they looked just like the scene in Finding Nemo where the fish are spelling out symbols and arrows, etc. to give directions!

I know exactly what you are saying about the difference between snorkeling Roatan and Hawaii. We have snorkeled in the Caribbean a dozen times or so and it is really cool, but to be swimming along and casually see the same fish we keep in our tanks at home or that we see everyday in a LFS is just really exciting.

Most of my snorkel buddies had no idea what the pretty fish were and probably got tired of me excitedly asking whether they noticed that sea cucumber or pipefish, etc.

[txav8r]

Did the schools of Jacks have a Bud Light in their fins? LOL



LOL!

[brpope]

Awesome photos! Man, I love Hawaii... guess after seeing those I'll be saving up to vacation there again. Here's a couple of pictures from our trip last year. ;)

http://lepopes.com/temple_small.JPG
Byodo In Temple on a misty day.

http://lepopes.com/P1000981.jpg
Gorgeous rainbow right before our rainforest hike.


http://lepopes.com/124.jpg

http://lepopes.com/186.jpg

http://lepopes.com/185.jpg
SHARK!!

http://lepopes.com/150.jpg
My wife holding a sea urchin.

http://lepopes.com/179.jpg
Me trying not to touch the turtle.

http://lepopes.com/208.jpg
He inked...

http://lepopes.com/PICT0049.JPG


http://lepopes.com/PICT0038.AVI

[kkiel02]

Very cool! I love those tangs and the Moorish Idol shots.

[Mrs. z28pwr]

Love the pictures!!!!! I miss diving:(