So we decided to sign up for an organized tour with Ocean Joy Cruises. From Waikiki, they brought us to the west coast of Oahu which is about an hour away. Our destination was the Ko Olina Resort & Marina (the same area where Aulani, Disney’s Resort in Hawaii is located).
We boarded the Koi ‘Oli ‘Oli at the Ko Olina Resort.
The day was gloomy – this was at around 730am. It even started drizzling but thanks to my Olympus OMD EM5, I could still shoot since it’s weather-proof. Yay!
On our way out to the sea, the captain pointed to a ship in the vicinity. It’s Captain Jack Sparrow’s ship in Pirates of the Carribean!
After cruising for some time, we spotted a rainbow. Beautiful!
Before we went out to snorkel, the crew gave us safety instructions and taught us how to signal if we needed help. I don’t have photos to share though of what we saw underwater because my Olympus camera is just weather-proof and not water-proof. Haha…
Anyway, we saw a lot of colorful fishes – schools and schools of various kinds of fishes, big and small, plus several sea turtles! It was my first time to see sea turtles on a snorkel trip. We even saw them rise from the floor to the surface. Yay!
After about 30-45 minutes of snorkeling, we want back to the boat to to catch some dolphin sightings. After a few minutes of cruising, the captain announced to look below the water and we saw a lot of dolphins underwater as if leading our boat!
I remember the Captain mentioning that these were spinner or long-nosed dolphins.
They were a lot! To the left and right (not captured in the frame below) are more dolphins! This is the most number of dolphins I’ve ever seen on a dolphin watching tour.
We went to another place to see a different kind of dolphins – the smallest species if I remember right - but they were hard to shoot. We didn’t stay long because by the way they moved, the captain could tell that they were a bit agitated because I think their sleep was disrupted so we just left them in peace.
I did capture one scenic shot near the dolphin watching area.
On our way back to the Ko Olina resort, they served Kalua Pork and other Hawaiian food on the boat. Yum!
And just before we returned to the Ko Olina resort, we passed by Captain Jack Sparrow’s ship again and here’s a better photo. :)
Ocean Joy Cruises has various packages and schedules – morning, lunch and sunset cruises. We took the earliest one (pick up time at 625am) and the tour costs about USD129 (pls note though that the actual onboard experience plus snorkeling is just around 1.5 hours). At the end of the tour, you can also buy a DVD documentary of the snorkeling tour you just had.
For more info, you can visit http://oceanjoycruises.com/default.html. But tours can also be easily booked from hotel tour desks.
