Capturing the Moment

  New Years started off with a bang for me here in Oahu. After some traditional new years food with friends Heidi and I grabbed our snorkel gear and headed to the east side of the island for some ocean time. There is always something so satisfying about being in the ocean. The day before I had led a tour along the southeast side of the island and the winds were being blocked by the island, opposite of what usually happens. This weather condition made flat calm conditions on the ocean's surface all along the east coast, opening up tons of snorkel and underwater photography locations that are usually too blown out by the trade winds. We trekked down to one of our favorite east coast dive spots at the Halona blowhole. Just beside the blowhole overlook there is a path down to a secret beach called Eternity Beach. Locals call it cockroach cove but I've never seen a cockroach there. Luckily the weather conditions were the same as the day before. The water felt a bit cooler...

Scorpionfish standing guard over the reef at Isla Verde   Isla Verde, the Green Island    Isla Verde was incredible. It is Puerto Galera’s ship rock or molokini. An offshore pinnacle just breaking the surface goes down   to an untold depth just a quarter mile off nearby Verde Island. Soft corals, hard corals, huge gorgonian sea fans, massive barrel sponges and millions of fairy basslets cover the steep wall. Leaf scorpionfish and an incredible amount of nudibranchs also dot the wall. I was pretty amazed that no big megafauna comes by but I hear from Amil that it is very very rare. Still an incredible two dives. The boat ride over from Puerto Galera takes about 45 minutes and we lucked out with a calm smooth crossing both ways.    The currents here can be quite tricky. Amil told us of being caught in a down current here that took him from 10meters down to 50meters. He was kicking as hard as he could but still was pulled down in the cur...