Our Affordable Hawaiian Vacation: 4th Day in Maui

Ornate reef structure typifies Ulua Beach-

Wailea, Maui (M. Leung)

It was our 4th day in Hawaii, and we were feeling lazy. Diving, and breathing compressed nitrogen, makes you tired.

I managed to persuade Mark to do another couple of shore dives with me, even though diving conditions were crappy the day before, and even though it was Mark's birthday.

We rented a couple of tanks from Maui Dreams Dive Company. We enjoyed meeting Teri, who is the store manager and course director there. She proposed that we dive Ulua Beach that day.

Shrimp-

Ulua Beach, Wailea, Maui

(M. Goodnow)

At the beach, we tripled up with Wade whose girlfriend doesn't dive. Wade had the courage to introduce himself to us at the beach, so of course we had to accept and dive with him.

Ulua Beach was an amazing shore dive, in spite of the 20-30' visibility. There were towering, ornate structures of coral. We saw the largest (2.5' long) pufferfish and the largest (1' long) frog fish I've ever seen. I managed to film the gigantic frog fish swimming several yards (see below). I learned later that frog fish like to stay in the same area their entire lives, so I felt enormously guilty that we disturbed it and caused it to swim such a long distance.

Video of Frog fish swimming-

Ulua Beach, Wailea, Maui (M. Leung)

Flat worm -

Ulua Beach, Wailea, Maui

(M. Goodnow)

Ulua Beach was definitely my favorite shore dive in Maui due to its interesting coral structures and the fact that I successfully navigated to the deeper second reef, and back, in poor visibility. During the dive, Mark almost got us lost and lead us to the adjacent beach, but I was constantly monitoring where we were and managed to get us back to our proper exit point.

Afternoon
It was Mark's birthday, so he got to do whatever he wanted. He elected to eat chips in bed while watching Star Wars. I really enjoyed pigging out next to him. Ah, simple pleasures.

In the evening, we walked around the beach outside of our hotel (see below). I highly recommend staying at Days Inn Maui in Kihei, Maui.  For a fraction of the cost as elsewhere, you can stay on the beach, be close to the dive operators' boat ramp, and be close to world class shore diving.

The beach outside of Days Inn Maui -
Kihei, Maui

Dinner was at Coconuts Fish House, which ironically is a restaurant named after a cat.

Mark had a craving for fish tacos-
Coconuts Fish House, Kihei, Maui

Dive Details

Dive #199: Ulua beach

Depth/Time/Temp: 43'/1:07 min/76 deg. F

Buddies: Mark and Wade

Sighted:

-biggest puffer I've ever seen: 2.5 feet long.

-huge tan frog fish bigger than my head, was told it was a female. Harassed it and it swam fast.

-turtle

-sea star legs (cut by harlequin crab)

-mark almost took us to the next beach over.

Dive #200: Ulua Beach

Depth/Time/Temp: 25'/0:54 min/77 deg. F

Buddy: Mark

Sighted:

-fuschia flat worm

-nudibranchs

-brittle star

-puffer resting (to stay out of the sandy water)

-octopus hiding in a crack

-turtle sleeping in a hole-Mina scared it and she killed some coral