18 Jan 2024
Whelp, my body is still on Wisconsin time; I woke up a little after 3am and couldn’t get back to sleep so, room tour!
I’m staying in a new-to-me area, in Waikoloa (which is north of Kona, where I normally stay), which is a golfing community, but it was in the right location so…
This is my home for the next week and a half:
Behind the curtain is a balcony:
I cheated and took this picture later in the day when the sun was out 🙂
Kitchen (with laundry across from the fridge):
Down the hall is bathroom #1:
and bedroom #1:
And at the end of the hall, bedroom #2:
with an attached bath:
It also has covered parking!
I had to drive down to Kona to pick up my dive computer, which I had sent down ahead of this trip for a battery change, so I figured this would be a good test run to see how long the drive from my apartment to the Kona harbor would take (just under 40 minutes, which I’m not looking forward to doing every evening, but I guess it’s better than staying in Kona and driving the other way and having to be up extra early to make the drive to the Kohala harbor for morning dives?).
Waikoloa is pretty remote though:
It’s a bit hard to see in pictures taken while I was driving, but the village is surrounded by old lava flows and has great view of the surrounding mountains/volcanoes.
Not pictured: GOATS!!! They are everywhere along the side of the road here! Most of them are dark brown and blend into the lava rocks and, while they are totally unfazed by cars zipping by them, as soon as you pull over to take a picture they zoom off. So no pictures 🙁
Since this is a golfing community, there is a lot of green space and grass:
If you’re into golf, it’s certainly a beautiful area, but I’m not sure standing around in the sun when it’s 80°+ sounds like much fun.
Dive #1 – Blackwater!
Finally, my lone dive of the day! Normally, I like to get a regular dive under my belt before jumping into blackwater dives, but the dive shop didn’t open in time for me to pick up my computer and make a morning boat so there’ll be no easing into this trip’s dives, but Ross was my guide for this dive!
Ross rocks- he’s an awesome photographer and is super-enthusiastic about blackwater diving. It ended up being a slower blackwater dive, but I still saw some new-to-me things, and it’s always great to see a familiar face (and he remembered me!)
“Spider Jelly”, aka a type of narcomedusa, Cunina sp.:
A siphonophore (net-caster) with his net all pulled in:
Larval (mantis?) shrimp:
Comb jelly:
Even on a slow dive, I can usually find a whole handful of these guys.
Chain of salps:
“X-marks the Spot jelly”, another type of hydromedusa:
Top down view of a little fish:
Tiny hitchhiker on a radiolarian colony:
Dance of the Comb jelly:
Another Comb jelly (like I said, it was a slow night):
“Snowflake Jelly”, yet another hydromedusa:
I think this is an appendicularian/larvacean!
It had a very, very translucent “shell” with a sparkly pair of pants inside:
Comb jelly:
Larval lobster profile:
My first pyrosome!
One of the larger jellies I’ve seen on a blackwater dive, :
Not my best blackwater- I struggled with my camera settings and strobe placement, and there weren’t a lot of critters to practice on (besides Comb jellies). Maybe tomorrow will be better?