Diving off Hawaii, summer 2006...

Following our memorable diving in Truk Lagoon and Bikini Atoll we flew on around the world to our next port of call - Hawaii. We only had three days there and due to the de-fizz requirements forced upon us by flights we could only carry out one day's diving. As you might expect Hawaiian diving is run by Americans - Hawaii is an American state after all - but what a consumate cluster f*ck these guys are making of it quite frankly. Don't get me wrong, they are efficient and very friendly but we felt it was both expensive and in many ways, amateurish. We carried out our first dive in a streaming current and unimpressive visibility on one of their "premier" wrecks... if the Mahi is a premier wreck then I wonder what they would make of Scapa Flow... it would probably blow their minds! Anyhow the surface interval between the two dives we had booked was just 30 minutes and I would hardly call the second dive a dive at all it was so shallow. No... they charge the earth for a so called "two dive day" and you are back at your hotel before lunch... most unimpressive, especially in view of the weighty $100 plus price tag.

The Mahi was a minesweeper and she lies in twenty some metres quite close in. She is relatively intact and there appeared to be some good swim through possibilities however the PADI dive guide expressly forbade anything but a potter around outside the wreck - not that that actually stopped us completely but we were most dissapointed after the extensive penetrations we had been carrying out in Truk and Bikini the previous few weeks. Anyhow, only the sighting of a solitary Eagle Ray and a Frogfish was anything worthy of note on an otherwise indifferent wreck.

No, I can't see us going to Hawaii again... it was over priced and over rated quite frankly... in a word, charm free...


But that was two words...

Diving the Mahi...


Click on any of the thumbnail pictures below to show a bigger image...





A swift peep inside the Mahi, Hawaii, summer 2006...

The overhanging bows of the Mahi wreck, Hawaii...

A patrolling Eagle Ray, Hawaii, summer 2006...

Strange bracing arrangement on the Mahi's bow...

A light bulb still in situ below decks within it's protective glass cover...

A heavily camouflaged Frogfish on the Mahi...

The mast collapsed across the wreck...

Goatfish on the Mahi...

Another view within the wreck...

Mooring bollards on the collapsing remains of the deck...




And the obligatory out of the water selection!!!

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The view across Honolulu from our hotel window...

The US battleship Missouri at anchor in Pearl Harbour. Missouri is the last surviving WWII battleship and was still in use in the last Gulf War...

A quad AA gun exactly the same as those we had seen underwater on the Saratoga at Bikini Atoll...

Pearl Harbour - an American submarine of the same class as the Apogon which we had dived at Bikini Atoll...

The conning tower and scopes on the submarine...

The Arizona Memorial at Pearl Harbour...

 

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