Molokini Crater
As traveling divers, we often get wrapped up in the desire to get to the most exotic destination we've heard or read about; it is an issue that I have been a victim of. However, recently I was reminded that excellent doesn't necessarily have to mean far, particularly for us on the West Coast. A recent unexpected invitation to my fiance and me to travel to Maui, Hawaii made the point very clearly to both of us. The short four and-a-half-hour flight from LAX to Maui - Kahului, HI found us in our condo near Lahaina, unpacked and scheduling our dives for the week - easy, peasy!
Though we dived several areas on Maui and the surrounding islands, I am going to focus on one specific site that was so enjoyable that we scheduled several return trips. The site was Molokini , a partially submerged volcanic crater a 45-minute boat trip from Lahaina Harbor. A crescent-shaped part of the rim that extends above water provides shelter from prevailing winds and currents and creates an amazing UW environment that is home to a high percentage of Hawaii's endemic reef species and with a drop-off close by, it isn't unusual to be visited by transiting pelagics. On our three days of diving, we encountered sharks on two days and a curious manta ray on another. Even though we were diving two days after hurricane Ana swept through the area, we enjoyed visibility well in excess of 100-feet and water temperatures ranging from 80° at the wall drop-off to 84° diving in the aquarium-like crater.
I'm not a marine biologist and don't even play one on TV, so my ability to name the myriad varieties of sea life is a bit limited, but those that I recognized include barracuda, cravalle, hawkfish, trumpet fish, goatfish, octopus, squirrel fish, big-eyes, Moorish Idols, spotted grouper, moray eels of numerous types and sizes and more types of butterfly fish than can even be imagined. And from the clouds of juvenile reef fish that swept over us and sometimes totally obscured the coral, it is easy to see just what a healthy, interesting, productive area this is.
So, a suggestion: when you're getting the urge to do some dive travel but are stymied by the cost to get there and be there, consider Hawaii. Consider Maui. And by all means definitely consider Molokini.
