Ko Olina Cat Trip

Well, the first thing I have to say for this post, is that Dramamine is my new best friend. I heartily apologize to anyone who may have filled that position previously, but you've been replaced.

See, the thing is, that I'm rather prone to motion sickness (see the post on surfing) and we had this boat trip scheduled, and I did not want to spend the whole trip being sick. So we bought a little vial of Dramamine pills and I took one before we left.

And I was not sick the entire trip. It was awesome.

Anyway, before all that, we got up Friday morning, and as it was John's birthday, I sent him out to snorkel in the lagoon while I packed up our stuff. Sadly, it was check out day. BUT, the Marriott Ko Olina Beach

Club has a "linger longer" policy, where your key card still works for everything but your room for the whole day after you check out. You can get in the parking garage, use the pools, the locker rooms, and even charge things to your account! It's just like getting to stay an extra day. We took advantage of this. We put the big suitcases in the car and put our computers in the hotel safe deposit box and they stored the other bags for us. We stored some clothes in the lockers (wicked nice locker room, with private showers, sauna and steam room) so we could change after we were done swimming. Then we hopped on the shuttle to the marina and got on the boat.

This is the catamaran boat.

This is what it looks like from the front. Right below those windows is a little platform where you can sit, and you can sit down the sides along the rails, and inbetween the rails running in front of the platform, there is a net that you can sit on and get splashed on while the boat is moving.

First, we motored out to see dolphins, and dolphins we did see! Here are a some swimming next to the boat. The two on the right are a mommy and baby pair. Someone on the crew said that the babies swim with their moms for three years.

Here's a nice picture with a whole bunch. These are Hawaiian Spinner Dolphins, which are about half the size of Bottlenose Dolphins. They were rolling over and slapping their tails, and every once in a while one would jump up out of the water.

We were very fortunate that the whale migration season is just starting, and we got to see some Alaskan Humpback Whales! At first they were kind of far away and hard to see, but they drove the boat out a little closer, and one popped up right next to the boat! This is the tip of his dorsal fin, and this picture is not zoomed in. It really was that close to the boat! The crew said we were very lucky to see both dolphins and whales on the same trip. We didn't see any turtles.

This particular company has a guaranteed dolphin or whale sighting policy. If you don't see dolphins or whales on your trip, they give you a ticket to come back for free and try again. There was a couple on our trip who were on a "try again" trip and had saved their tickets for two years. Here's a view of the resort from the ocean. Ours is the one on the right. You can barely see the electrical plant on the left, it's the one with the tall smokestack. That's where we went for snorkeling. The plant uses sea water to cool the machines, and dumps the warm water into the ocean, which encourages algae growth, which attracts lots of fish. There's a reef right in front of the plant that's teeming with beautiful fish.

This is me snorkeling. They gave everyone brand new snorkels and they clean and re-use their masks and flippers. We forgot our own equipment, so we had to use theirs. They also have these vests that everyone has to wear, but you don't have to blow them up if you want to dive down. I blew mine up about half way. Just a little added security. I'm a bit timid in deep water. Please note that this time snorkeling, I'm wearing a rash guard shirt with SPF 50 in the fabric and shorts over my suit, plus I have three layers of SPF 30 sunscreen on. There was no sunburning happening this day! (that's John's knee in the corner, sporting his brand new swim trunks after he lost his somewhere)

Here are three Angelfish and a Convict Tang. Those Convict Tangs were all over the place. I'd say I've seen more of them than any other fish on this trip. The Tang is below the others and kind of under the rock a little.

Here's John with his deflated vest.

I took this picture of a guy fishing out in the water as we were heading back to the marina. Almost immediately after I put the camera down, a huge giant wave came in and knocked that guy right over. He was okay. But he was sure wet.

And, because it was John's birthday, he got a perfect ending to his perfect day and a nice way to end our stay at Ko Olina. A perfect sunset. We sat on the beach at the lagoon and watched the sun set, then we left and headed back to Waikiki.