For Christmas Nana gave our family passes to the Atlantis Submarine so we could take Jon for submarine rides (I know... super awesome). The first time we went on a ride we found out the pass is good for all three subs in Hawaii, Waikiki, Lahaina, and Kona. We have really been wanting to go do the Maui one since it's whale season and there's a ton of whales in that channel. Plus it just sounded like a fun adventure. We had also heard the Maui Ocean Center was pretty cool so we wanted to have a sea creature adventure on Maui.
After the months of talking we finally did it. The tipping point was when the awesome Dylan Payne invited us to come crash with him and his family (he was home for about a week for a friend's wedding). The Paynes were amazing hosts and we cannot thank them enough. Thanks to them it was one of the funnest trips we have been on in a while!
The only regret we have is the photos. The camera never made it out of the bag except for when we were at the aquarium and on the boat, and even those pictures didn't come out all that nice. We wish we had pictures of the Payne family to remember their radness by :(
Here's Jon hiding out as we were trying to head out the door...
One of the Island Air rampers from Kapalua, Al, is a volunteer at the Ocean Center. He was kind enough to pick us up from the airport, drive us all the way to the center, and then spend his afternoon off giving us a personal tour of the center. It was super awesome. Thanks Al! Another photo regret... this is one of the only pics of him with the kids.
The Ocean Center has an awesome tank with a tunnel in it...
LOTS of sharks...
And even a little tiger shark!
They have a touch pool that rocks...
Lots of interactive displays...
And they put on some pretty intriguing demonstrations. Here's Dylan being mesmerised by the feedings/presentation in the open ocean tank (the one with the tunnel and sharks).
That's Al and Jon waving at the diver after the demonstration.
This is the tugboat that takes the sub in and out of the harbor each morning and night. During the day it serves as the control ship to make sure the sub doesn't surface under anything like a kayaker, boat, or whale.
The sub...
The Carthaginian.. Atlantis sunk this ship as an artifical reef.
And Jon was estatic to see a reel White Tip Shark in the open ocean. The heavy blue cast to these pics is due to the way light is filtered underwater, we're at about 100 feet and all the red, orange, and yellow light has been filtered out by this depth.
When we surfaced there were whales pretty close by the ship. They weren't doing much, this was about as exciting a thing as they did, but it was still cool.
And this is at the airport waiting for our flight.
Like I said, I wish we would have taken pictures up at the house and with the Payne family. I guess we'll have to go do it again someday and do it right! Thanks to all those who made this trip possible, we had a fantastic time!
