Hanging out at Garden Eel Cove in Kona...

I hadn't had the camera underwater in ages and thought I'd do a short Captain's dive between dives up at Garden Eel Cove. We've had a pretty good south swell the last little bit, and this day it was huge and the bay off the airport and right outside the harbor were the best bets that day, we were training students so we opted for good conditions and did both dives up north off the airport.

Garden Eel Cove is a very good example of Hawaiian hard coral reef. It was protected by Keahole point back when Hurricane Iniki came through a decade or so ago and it still has lots of old growth coral. You can see all the hard corals on the dropoff in the video. Unfortunately the video doesn't do it justice... largely blue, when you're actually diving it you get to see all of the browns and golds of the corals and the color of the fish.


Later,

Steve

First big swell of the "winter" in Kona....

just finished. We had a pretty good sized swell come through the last few days. We happened to not have charters scheduled during the worst two days of it, it's been settling down now that were going out again and diving has been fine. According to the news this was the biggest September swell we've had since '97. I know I haven't recalled seeing anything like that this time of year since I've been here. In the next day or so we should be back to our normal September/October great diving conditions.

We're in our "slow" season again. You can really tell it on the water, not a heck of a lot of boats out, even the fishermen are out in smaller numbers it seems. You can tell one thing though... Ironman's coming... We're seeing more tri-athletes riding their bikes and running alongside the highway. They usually start trickling in about three weeks prior to the big race and then the last week and a half they're all over the place. I get a fair number of inquiries as to whether it generates crowds for diving - it's my perception that it doesn't really bring in the divers in any real noticeable numbers.

The pic above is of Garden Eels. I likely have this posted elsewhere on the blog, but this was my header photo 'til I replaced it with the shark, so I may not. This blog's approaching 600 posts over 4 years, and just as many photos, and I'm not sure my brain just can keep track of it all anymore... gotta go to the library and check out a memory book. These critters are mesmerizing to watch, swaying in the current picking plankton out of the water.

Garden Eels

Garden Eels are a favorite of many divers. They live in the sand below the reef, typically in depths below 80' in most of Kona. We do have a couple of spots where they are found in shallower water... it all basically depends on what depth the reef ends at. In some locations you can find them by the thousands, spread out every few inches. They are plankton feeders and spend their days sticking out of the sand awaiting food to drift by. This particular shot was taken at Garden Eel Cove, home of the manta night dive which has been very busy as of late (17 mantas were there a couple nights ago when we last went).

Later,

Steve

Gorgeous day in Kona today

Winter is arriving, and it's noticeable.... Brrrr.... we've been getting down into the mid to upper 60's at night where we live. It's nice and dry though, and we're still getting into the 80's during the day.

Today I'm going to head to the boat to do some cosmetic work, needs it, I'll be working on some things along those lines while we're slow in early December. We've been diving a bit since my return from the mainland. 3 manta night outings and several day trips. Latest water temperature readings had pretty much everyone coming up with 81 degrees.

We had another 5.0 aftershock last week. I was in the truck and didn't feel it, when I pulled up to the gas station they had me wait because they had to reset the pumps. As far as I know there was no damage from this quake. Everyone is still a bit on edge after the big one last month. 2 nights ago somebody started a rumor that a big quake and tsunami was predicted for the next early morning, apparently this rumor somehow had thousands of people falling for it - people were buying emergency supplies and even evacuating coastal homes in some cases.... Earthquakes CAN'T be predicted - it was all a hoax. The state is now trying to track down how the rumor got legs and actually spread across the state in a few hours.... probably some blogger or a radio guy having fun.

Above is an underwater picture of some small tiape that have taken to hanging out at Garden Eel Cove.

later,

Steve

Hawaiian Garden Eels. Ever seen 30-40 eels at once?

Aloha,

These guys are found at depth off Kona by the thousands. This short eel video was taken in a single spot, there are acres of these guys at this location.

Hawaiian Garden Eels (Gorgasia hawaiiensis)are a plankton feeding eel which spends it's life buried in the sand with it's head sticking out feeding all day long. According to divemaster/instructor/boat captain Bob, these guys grow to about 70 feet long - Prove him wrong! Actually, we usually only see about 12-18 inches of these critters sticking out, they'll back down into their burrows as you approach and they never do seem to get their entire body out, so you never know. The books put them at maybe a couple feet long.

This was taken at Garden Eel Cove, which is also home of the Manta Ray night dive. It's one of the locations we tend to see Garden Eels shallower than their typical 80 feet and deeper. At this location they are relatively used to people so you can slowly approach to within a few feet without them completely backing into their holes, in other areas you are lucky to get within 15-20 feet of them and still see them.

later,

Steve