Malikini

Another amazing day.

Woke up early to catch a taxi to the harbor to board our adventure with Trilogy 2. It was a catamaran out to Malakini island to snorkel.

We got great seats, right in the front. As soon as we pulled out of the harbor, we were served coffee, cinnamon rolls, juice and fruit. The ride was beautiful, about an hour or so out to Malakini which is not an island but a rock.

They passed out the snorkel gear and gave us instructions. Even with my practice, my anxiety was kicked up pretty high. But I did what I always do, I took deep breaths, calmed my muscles and just did it.

I put on my gear (I did skip the fins) and went down the steps and followed Scott out into the clear, blue ocean. I put on the mask, sealed it, put the mouth gear in and put my face in and kicked. It was amazing. Right away, I was in a swarm of beautiful black tropical fish. I followed them and saw a bright yellow and black angel fish. I saw so many fish. I just kept kicking around and floating and looking and pointing. The photographer went under us and took our picture. We swam around for about an hour then got back onto the boat.

We stopped further out this time and got back into the water. This time it was crazy deep, couldn’t see the bottom at all. Scott directed me out to a reef and someone yelled “sea turtle!”. There he was, a big green one. He had his head out of the water so I went within about 5 feet and put my mask in the water and watched him dive down and disappear into a reef cave.

We swam around and looked at the beautiful reef and more amazing fish, blue ones, clear ones, multi color ones, big and small. Back onto the boat and we were served cocktails (mai tai di did not partake today) and lunch—amazing chicken served on a bed of rice with salad and a Hawaiian roll.

We started back to the harbor and the boat slowed and turned and someone yelled “whale!” We watched and saw the fluke (tail) and fin and spout. He looked like a small one. He kept swimming around coming closer to the boat. Eventually his mama joined him and we could see two fins. Everyone was so excited and trying to videotape. I was again moved to tears.