Oh the colors you may see

The black durgon is a triggerfish, named humuhumu 'ele'ele in Hawaiian.  They are graceful swimmers and fun to watch, but often difficult to approach.  When viewed under the right conditions, they display a lovely pattern of blue lines and golden hues.

Today we encountered some in a cleaning station that were displaying the striking blue pattern.

Just beginning to display the blue line phase

The fish to the right is another black durgon, in black phase

This fish has its trigger (first dorsal spine) erect.  Same species is on the left.

Heading south

This morning, we returned to South Point.  Our last visit there was on a super windy day, and we couldn't really walk around and investigate much.  Today the winds were calmer.  Some fishermen were fishing, and a couple of people jumped into the water off the cliff.

The South Point Complex is considered an important archaeological site, and records of human occupation there have been studied extensively.  This is one of the few places on earth where fishermen are able to go deep sea fishing from shore.

We parked near the end of the paved road, and walked down to the site of the historic canoe mooring holes.  Quite an impressive sight.  The holes in the rock enabled fishermen to tie their canoes to the rock with a strong rope and fish in extremely deep water, where anchoring isn't possible.  The danger of fishing off South Point is that the prevailing current sweeps south to Antarctica, with no land in between.

At last

I've taken dozens of photos of this fish in the last 4 weeks.  None of them were in focus until today.  So, finally, I can share the reef triggerfish with you.  Its Hawaiian name is humuhumu nukunuku apua'a (made familiar to the world via the "little grass shack" song of 50 or 60 years ago.)

This species grows to about 10 inches, and they are always fun to encounter.  They strike me as modern art with fins.

More fish du jour

We spent another morning, snorkeling and taking photos.

Today's featured photos include a new eel, the whitemouth moray (puhi 'oni'o).

A boxfish, the brightly colored male spotted boxfish (moa).

A puffer, the Hawaiian whitespotted toby (sorry, don't have the Hawaiian name).

And a school of brown surgeonfish (mai'i'i).

The Saddle Road

Today we drove up the new Saddle Road to the Mauna Kea Visitor Information Station (elevation 9200 feet).  The Saddle Road crosses the island between Mauna Loa to the south and Mauna Kea to the north.  It was clear as we drove up, but we could see clouds moving in from Hilo as we headed down and to the west.  It was sunny and 56 degrees at the visitor center.

View of Mauna Kea looking north from visitor center

The slope of Mauna Loa, looking south from Saddle Road.  Also serious cloud cover.

Mauna Kea, looking north from Saddle Road

We took the old Saddle Road fork down towards Waimea.  The topography and ecosystem changed a lot along the way.

Rolling hills along old Saddle Road.  Maui can be seen in the background.

Grasslands along old Saddle Road

From Waimea, we could see the observatories high atop Mauna Kea and the snow.

The rain caught up with us in Waimea, about 45 minutes later.

Dance competition

Today we caught a few minutes of the Tahitian dance competition in Kona.  They have several divisions of competitions.  We saw one pair compete, and then a team of little girls that were all dressed the same.  Quite entertaining, although we were viewing it through a vendor's booth.

After they took a break from dancing for lunch, the Tahitian band that had been accompanying the paired dancers relocated to a shady area and just started playing for themselves, in a little circle.  They were quite good, and seemed happy to be able to sing and play together.

Also in the shade, we enjoyed a Tahitian drum band.  They were quite good as well.

I bought a small souvenir: a piece of cow bone carved into a humpback whale letter opener.

Whitetip

Today, while snorkeling in Kealakekua Bay, we found several whitetip reef sharks, sleeping under a ledge.  Their heads were all under the ledge, leaving their white-tipped fins sticking out for us to see.  There were 5 of them, of varying sizes.  Nice treat!

We also saw lots of yellow tang.

And an initial phase bullethead parrotfish, followed by a Christmas wrasse.

The view from the water

OK, from under water, mostly.

Today we had the great fortune to find an active fish cleaning station.  So I'm sharing photos of fish in the cleaning station.

Orangespine unicorn fish with Hawaiian cleaner wrasse

Convict surgeonfish with Hawaiian cleaner wrasse

And an un-posed family portrait that Bori took.

I'm the yellow snorkel Vero and Jeff are the other two

The ocean has calmed down

So the beaches are open again, and we've been out snorkeling.  After 2 days of beach closures, due to high surf, swells, and wind, it was nice to get back into the Pacific.

Armed with our cameras, we looked for photos to share.

Bori's big find was a snowflake moray, known in Hawaiian as puhi kapa.  This moray was about 24 inches long.

My big find was a saddleback butterfly fish, kika kapu.  This butterflyfish was about 6 inches long.

Painted church

Today we visited the Painted church, St. Benedict's Catholic Church in Honaunau.  It sits above Kealakekua Bay.  Lovely setting, and quite striking inside.

The front of the church

The painted ceiling

A painting of Hell

An artisan working in the ancient way, at the nearby Place of Refuge.

A brief stop at the Volcano

Today we headed southeast, and arrived at Hawaii Volcanoes National Park in about 2 hours.  We had been there 2 years ago, and a lot has changed since then.


The Kileuea Crater that was spewing hot lava in 2017 exploded in recent lava flows, and the hot lava flowed out to the southeast.  As a result, the crater collapsed, and parts of it now look like a pile of gravel.  But things are still smoking, and it's a really interesting sight.

The crater road doesn't go much farther than the steam vents due to the 80,000 recent earthquakes, but there is a lookout adjacent to the steam vents.

Another beach visit

This beach is known as Manini'owali Beach, also as Kua Bay.  It is north of Kailua Kona, and although it has a paved road, and nice facilities, there is no signage for the beach off the highway.  The first time we visited this beach (2 years ago) it had virtually no sand.  Photos taken in summer show a long, mostly sandy beach.  Winter storms often remove lots of sand, so season matters regarding how sandy the beach is.  This winter the beach offers something for everyone.

For the sand lovers.

For the water lovers.

For the privacy lovers.

A little history

Today, we visited the Pu'uhonua o Honaunau National Historical Park.  It is a royal center and place of refuge dating back as far as 1400 AD.  Much of what remains has been reconstructed, but the site is quite peaceful, and beautiful.

The great wall marks the division between the royal grounds and place of refuge

Beautiful carvings