Capturing the Moment

 Some of the smallest, most overlooked creatures on the reef can be some of the most beautiful. Today's exploratory dive didn't produce a ton of finds but the ones it did turned out to be very photogenic. I am not sure the name of the sight, but somewhere in North Kihei Heidi and I donned our scuba gear and kicked out over coral and silty bottom. Out a bit deeper we descended and quickly found a pretty rare nudibranch (the orange and blue tipped one), and a Hawaiian Green Lionfish. Then heading out a little deeper something swimming through the water caught my eye. It turned out to be this beautiful flatworm that I later learned is called a fine lined flatworm. It undulated as it swam through the water much like a spanish dancer nudibranch. A couple of moray eels and a conger eel, which is rarely spotted during the daytime, rounded out a fun dive. We probably don't have to go back to this spot but now we know the underwater coast a little better.

'View From the Office'

Jolly Green Giant, the holy grail Jolly Green Giant (Ceratosoma sinuatum)   Searching for nudibranchs and other rarely seen creatures has become a passion for Heidi and myself out here in Maui. But up until now we have only been searching 'Nudi Flats', our secret dive sive, during the day. Once we finally decided to explore the place at night it was like a different reef. The major find on the dive and one that we have been searching for since we found out about its existence was the Jolly Green Giant nudibranch ( Ceratosoma sinuatum ). This little guy is considered the holy grail for nudibranch hunters out here in Hawaii, and we finally found one! Up until now we havn't seen these beautiful greens and light blues on any of our nudibranch finds. Heidi joked that now we can stop diving. Three snow goddess nudibranchs Other nudibranchs and flatworm quickly followed. Snow goddess nudibranchs and kangaroos seemed to be perched out on rocky outcroppings, a giant...

 There are several secret places to find some pretty amazing nudibranchs here on Maui. One nudibranch resource that often gets overlooked is the tide pool. If you go out at night and find a good series of tide pools you can find all kinds of creatures to wonder at. This brightly colored juvenile Spanish Dancer Nudibranch showed off its beautiful colors and patterns as it swam gracefully through the water of one of the deeper tide pools. This nudibranch was about the size of Heidi's finger as you can see in the picture. Hopefully it will grow into a nudibranch as large as her arm!  This almost translucent slug which hasn't forgone a shell like true nudibranchs is called a swollen bubble shell, or Hydatina amplustre. This wild looking nudibranch pictured on the right is Catriona sp. #1, a rarely seen nudibranch first described from Hawaii in 2008.  Heidi found three of these very close to each other in one of the bigger tide pools. ...

My buddy Ben and I headed out to catch the little south swell hitting Lahaina side and we took his new toy with us, a GoPro camera. It worked very well with some interesting outcomes. The way it can stop the action and catch water in mid air is pretty amazing. I really enjoyed seeing a totally different perspective of surfing. I learned some things I could do better and found that this camera makes the waves look pretty big. A rare look completely encased in the tube of a wave is another added benefit of having a GoPro camera.

 Searching the walls and ceilings of overhangs and caves is a must at this scuba site known locally as 5 caves or 5 graves, or turtle town after the abundant reptile residents. While most scuba divers are watching for turtles and other mega fauna Heidi and I were on our typical hunt for smaller creatures like nudibranchs. 5 Caves is a stellar nudibranch dive, day or night. We get the usual suspects here of phyllidia, white margin, and fuchsia flatworms, but if you looks very hard the dedicated nudibranch diver can be in for a real treat. Today it was that and more!  After seeing a big octo on the kick out to the reef Heidi got the sightings started with a Tom Smith's nudibranch. As I was taking this picture of it I noticed just to the right a gold lace nudibranch almost perfectly blending in. That is usually the way of nudibranch spotting. Once you stop and really look at an area you will find more and more. Heidi also found another gold lace on the sand, two yellow noume...

this devil scorpionfish was walking across the sand green lionfish on the satellite rock  After a successful boat dive to Molokini the Maui Diamond II took us to one of their favorite spots, Wailea Pt. It was a bit windy and choppy at the surface but once we descended the peace and tranquility that comes with scuba diving immersed us. Josh, our divemaster, wanted to show us this satellite rock located far off the reef so we headed off over the sand. There were a few tiny little rocks with baby eels and damselfish on the way and also a lot of halimeda grass beds where the very rare sea horse reportedly hides. I didn't see a sea horse but we did come across a very interesting site. One sea turtle was held fast on the back of another in a mating position as the other flapped its flippers slowly rolling over and over on their way up to the surface. I have seen this behavior just a couple of times here in Maui but the really interesting thing is that pretty much all the actual...

 Maui has a plethora of shore diving opportunities which keeps me very busy, but whenever I get a chance to go out on a dive boat I jump at it. Today I went out with Maui Dreams and was happy to see both divemasters were my good friends, Josh and Jess. The sunset was beautiful on the drive to the harbor and an early morning sugar cane fire made the scene more breathtaking. It was a sign of things to come.   Not burning to come, rather beautiful sights. As the frigate birds perched on Molokini watched over us we descended along the Enenue side of Molokini. A white tip reef shark awaited us about 100ft down on the sandy slope below the reef line but I was interested in smaller things today. Nudibranchs! And lucky enough for me I found a couple of really good ones. The blue dragon nudibranch is common to find on Molokini dives, but rarely seen anywhere else on Maui. The I came across a beautiful white nudibranch with a gold rim which I had never seen before...which is a bi...