Hawaii, Day 3

This morning we had to get up to an alarm clock. Lame. But, at least it was all in the name of fun. It was about a 45 minute drive down the the dock where we were meeting the dolphine discovery people. 

When we arrived, I couldn't get over how blue the water was. I've never seen a crayon, a pain, a color on the computer or even a picture capture the true blue of it. I just wanted to stare at it. We spent several minutes getting signed in and finding out who our captains were. 

There were three different boats taking a crew out to search for dolphins. Once all of that was out of the way we finally loaded up into our boat with seven other adventurers, a tourist and our captain. We got off of the shoreline a little bit and then our captain was telling us about what to expect. 

She explained that these are wild dolphins and it was possible we might not even find them. However, they have a very high success rate of finding them. Other than that, it was pretty much just info on the dolphins themselves. Finally we were off on our search to find them. I was sitting near the front of the boat on the right side. 

The boat was sort of like a small pontoon and also very raft like. So when the boat took off at quicker speeds the front would raise up higher than the back and bounce with the waves. I thought it was pretty fun. 

I loved staring down into the water. It didn't take me long to realize why this water looked so blue. The water itself was perfectly clear. The bottom, however, was all sorts of blue: blue, green, turquoise, teal. I could see different corals and reefs there too. I could see straight through to the bottom. Even as the water rippled out from the boat causing tiny white waves as the water folded over itself, I could still see through it. It was that clear. 

We searched for the dolphins for probably an hour with no luck. But then...then we hit major jackpot. There was a huge pod of them hanging out in a cove. As soon as we got close enough I started to gear up. I rushed my fins onto my feet, wiped my goggles one last time and then pressed them to my face and pulled the strap around my head. I quickly adjusted my snorkel to fit in my mouth and checked to make sure it was securely snapped to the side of my goggle straps. Then I grabbed two water cameras and tossed one to Cory and strapped the other to my right wrist. I got up on the edge of the boat, slung my feet over into the water and lowered myself into the ocean. 

What I experienced today cannot be fully captured with my verbal or written words. And it was probably an even more enhanced experience simply because I'm so obsessed with these majestic creatures. 

Immediately upon entering the water I saw dozens of dolphins. There was one to my left not 5 feet away from me! 

The dark gray on his back had tiny little diamond shapes all over it from the rays coming down from the sun. His dorsal fin was especially dark. Even blackish. The top of his body all the way from his nose to his tail was a dark gray, and just below that was a small stripe of charcoal grey. His tummy was white. Very white. He swam right in front of me, close enough to touch. 

My heart raced faster with my excitement and I kicked my feet quickly to use my 'fins' to follow him more. I couldn't keep up though. Then I looked down. There were dozens of them below me as well. 

They were so peaceful, so serene. It looked as if they were barely moving. They didn't seemed bothered by us swimming with them at all. They were quite good at humoring us for the swim. Quite chatty too, they were very vocal making whistling and clicking sounds constantly. 

I could see a few tiny ones, not even half the size of the rest: babies. Now, anything that is smaller than it's larger form is ridiculously cute to me. So I got real excited to see the little tiny dolphins swimming right beneath their mothers, never getting more than a few feet away. 

I started snapping away with my little camera. Sometimes when it clicked and I would wind it to prepare for my next snap, the noises would cause them to stare right at me. One of them turned his whole head to look right at me, but not his body at all. I could see all the little rolls and wrinkles on his neck as he turned it. So cute. 

After a while of swimming we were called back to our boat for a snack. So we climbed in and had some chips and cookies and some water. Within 10 minutes or so we had found a lot more dolphins. Hundreds. Literally. At least 250 - a mega pod. 

So back into the water we all went. There were so many to interact with it was hard to pick which ones to focus on. There was one that swam right along side me for several minutes, even brushing my shoulder a few times. There was another that came at me from straight on and stopped right in front of my face. I petted him, several times (even though you weren't suppose to pet them). 

I was following along side three adults and a baby when another adult came up from below me and stopped at my left side and opened his mouth real wide and then shut it again. 

He did this several times and let out a few noises. He appeared to be excited. Like he was trying to play or something. Then he dove back down so far I couldn't see him anymore, but within seconds he shot back up and jumped his entire body out of the water twirling and flipping in ways that made captive dolphin shows look mild. 

When he shot back into the water he stopped at my right side this time and opened and shut his mouth again several times before swimming off, too quickly for me to follow. 

It was odd to me how similar their behaviors reminded me of dogs. The sun shining down on the ocean sent tons of small light rays all over the place. The movement in the water caused the rays to appear to be moving and flashing all over. 

When the dolphins would swim through the spots where rays were shining down it would make all sorts of white patterns on their dark, gray skin. They were particularly beautiful to look at in those moments. 

The dolphins eventually started to group together and just swim in a giant circle around the cove (they were starting to sleep). When dolphins sleep only half of their brains shut down so that they continue to swim, breathe, etc. I would get to see them for about 10 minutes, but then I wouldn't see them again for several minutes. 

This, I think, was the cause of my unfortunate misery. When there were no dolphins to focus on I was just staring down into the seemingly endless ocean. All I could see was just...blue. Since there was nothing else to focus on I also noticed how much the water was causing my body to move around with the waves on the surface. I started to feel extremely nauseous. I toughed it out and waited for the dolphins to make a few more laps and then I decided I needed to go back to the boat, at least for a little while. 

So I found the boat and swam back to it. By the time I reached it I was feeling especially vomitty. I tossed my fins in and climbed up the latter and sat on the edge of the boat. The boat felt like it was moving even more. Bobbing up and down, up and down, and swaying with every movement of the ocean. It made me feel even worse. 

I couldn't even look out all all the dolphins that were clearly visible from even the boat. Cory noticed me and came back to the boat as well. I told him I thought I was going to vomit. I get motion sickness a lot and say that a lot, so I'm sure he probably didn't believe me. There were 4 other people on the boat along with the captain and several people in the water quite near our boat. I looked at the captain and asked if I were going to spew should it just be over the boat. She told me yes. 

I stood up to move over to my seat and that was as far as I got. I dodged over the side of the boat as fast as I could to...lose my previously eaten snacks. The captain was nice enough to move the boat so I at least didn't have to continue to look at it while I remained bent over the side of the pontoon. 

As soon as I turned around to take a drink of water from the bottle Cory had brought me, it happened again. It was so embarrassing! Several people saw me hurl into the ocean where several other people where still swimming with dolphins. 

Then again, I guess all of the animals in the ocean do all of their business there. But still. Yucky. I was completely miserable for the rest of the trip. 

Luckily it was only about a half hour longer. Soon our crew was called back to the boat and we were on our way back to the dock. This time I couldn't enjoy the view of the pretty blue water or the hundreds of dolphins swimming along side the boat. I had to basically keep my eyes closed the rest of the way, because even though that made me feel sick...it was less so than trying to focus on anything I could see when my eyes were opened - because everything was moving. 

When the boat loaded I was back off to the back seat of the car with the AC on high for a half hour. Poor hubby. 

Hopefully, he won't have to go through that again. Hopefully, there will be no more motion sickness. 

So throwing up is a huge deal for me. I haven't thrown up since I was a sophomore in high school. I absolutely hate to vomit. Hate it. It definitely falls within the many weird phobias I have. I hate it. I can fight down vomit like no other, man. Each time I lose that fight, it always feels like a traumatic thing to me. 

I hate the cold sweat and burning in your throat and nose and the weak shaky feeling that comes afterwards. 

Needless to express any further, it's always a big deal for me when it happens. And Especially since I hadn't thrown up in so long. Bleh. I eventually calmed down and we went back to the first beach we'd come to when we first arrived in Hawaii. 

Such a beautiful, calm, people-less beach. We had a picnic there in the shade of some trees. It was nice. We headed back to the resort after our beach picnic. We both showered and prepared to go explore some of the little shops around here. The weather was absolutely perfect. Probably somewhere around 70 with a light, consistent breeze. Absolutely perfect weather. 

All of the little mall stores here are all connected to each other but when you're not in a store you're outside. Like an outlet/outdoor mall, sort of. There were lots of fun little shops and I'll definitely want to buy some things before we leave. 

However, I'm saving my 'fun money' until the very end in case something comes up between now and then that I'd rather have. After some shopping and dinner, just at one of the little restaurants in the mall, we came back to the resort and headed down to the beach. 

Again, very few people were out. It felt like we were the only ones out there. The sun had already set and the only evidence of it's existence was a few pink, yellow and orange streaks scattered low in the sky. The moon was out in full force and sent down a nice, dim white light that covered the beach. 

At home you can't really walk around outside and see fine just off of the light from the moon. But here, you can. We took a stroll all the way over to the other side of the beach, furthest from our resort. 

There we did a little bit of exploring and settled into a quiet, somewhat secluded area for a bit. 

Now, we're back in the hotel room all ready for bed. We're going to get up early in the morning to go out and see the sunrise on the beach! Of course, then we'll come back to the room for some more sleep! I'm excited about the photo opportunity!