At the end of April I had the privilege of getting to visit the lovely “garden isle” of Kauai! I’d been to Oahu 10 years ago, and also did a one day whirlwind visit of the big island, but that was in my BS days (Before Scuba!), so I was anxious to sample the diving in the state of Hawaii as well as enjoy the beauty of the oldest of the Hawaian islands - Kauai.
I researched as much as I could, following much of the advice on this board and speaking with folks who had lived there. I also purchased The Ultimate Kauai Guidebook: Kauai revealed” and it was SO WORTH it! Just spending your time checking out all the tips and places this book has to offer would take months.
I ended up booking my dives through Bubbles Below . They were professional and very helpful – but more on that a little later.
Topside Kauai is as advertised – SO beautiful. As with the Big Island there are several distinct climate areas, and if it’s raining in one part of the island you head for the other. There’s always a place to find the sun, and more beaches than any of the other islands IIRC. I love the “undeveloped” and laid back feel of the island. There are hotels and resorts but I hardly saw a building over three stories while we were there, and you were never more than a very short drive away from the “wild” of Kauai. I love that you can do Kauai “on the cheap” or pay as much as you want on the high end. It’s a great place to spend some vacation days and get some down time or play as hard as you want to play.
Bassman and I ended up doing 4 dives on the last two days I was there. I had hoped to do more, but alas, the weather did not cooperate. There are things to do on the island year round, but the best diving is in the Summer when the weather cooperates. Because of surge and wind there are times when it’s very difficult to dive. We had swell coming one way and wind coming from the other, giving the washing machine effect and churning up viz pretty good and limiting what sites you could go to and making entry and exit from the dive boat an adventure best left for another day. The first part of the week dives were actually cancelled by most of the operators – a pretty unusual occurrence. I wanted to dive Niihau (touted by many as the best dive in Hawaii, running neck and neck with Molikini crater) and the NaPali coast but the weather did not cooperate.
The Diving
Day 1 of diving we battled our way through the waves and surge, tied up to the buoy, and dropped into 20’ viz. It was positively Redondo like! The crew searched valiantly for a site with more visibility, but the sites we explored also had swells that were literally twice the height of the boat and with new divers we elected to not try the adventure of the swim step to get back in. The second dive saw maybe 40’ viz, but not much more.
Day 2 the wind changed, and while we still had swell the viz opened up to 60’ then 80’ on our last dive. The captains were very professional, the boat was adequate (not fancy), and our divemaster Travis shared his love of critters and care for newbie divers with equal sensitivity and passion. His even keel temperament made for a great boat, and even though we dove as a group he let the more experienced divers breathe their tanks down and not come up when the newer divers were out of air.
The Critters
The islands do not have the coral infrastructure that some Caribbean reefs have, but the step-downs, caverns, lava tubes, overhangs and other structure make for a very cool diving experience. We saw a fair amount of hard coral, lots of the typical reef fish, and of course the abundant Honu – the protected Green Sea Turtles. Highlights for me were my first Whitetip Reef Sharks, Turtle cleaning stations, and of course the macro I love so much.
Here’s few pics to wind up the report. Go if you get a chance – but if diving is your priority try and go in the Summer months.
How can you not fall in love with the magnificent Green Sea Turtle? They are huge... These guys were an easy 200lbs and they get bigger.
I found at least one unID'd nudi to keep me going till I got back in our PNW water.
The endemic Hawaiian Red Lionfish was a treat.
Probably my favorite find was this little shrimp - unID'd as of yet (I dont' have a Hawaiian invert book) - he was on a piece of wire coral maybe 18 inches long, and he was the size of a grain of rice.
The rest of the pics are in the links above.
