Our turboprop aircraft banks sharply in direction of the runway, and Kona’s aquamarine waters and black lava shoreline come into sight. That is Hawaii, the BIG Island, PADI Membership™ occasion vacation spot for the subsequent 8 days.
PADI Membership members ages 15 to 69 have traveled the space to expertise a tremendous week of diving and topside enjoyable, with worldwide illustration from Kenya, Columbia, Canada, Switzerland, Dominican Republic and the continental United States.
Practically half the Kona crew is right here to reconnect with pals from earlier PADI Membership adventures within the Florida Keys, Belize, and Bonaire. However what’s PADI Membership? PADI Membership is the world’s largest neighborhood of scuba divers, ocean lovers, and ambassadors of the ocean. Our love of diving and distinctive member advantages assist us keep linked with the underwater world year-round, even once we can’t get within the water.
The Kona WhatsApp group chat has been abuzz for weeks with chatter about upcoming PADI Open Water Diver certifications, wetsuit suggestions, the benefits of diving with enriched air (nitrox), and extra. It now pings with journey updates from Membership members en-route to Hawaii.
After the dive bag schlepp, resort check-in, and gathering our complimentary mai tai tickets, we’re on island time. Tomorrow is a day for island exploration, scuba gear drop-off, and non-obligatory checkout dives. Hawaii Volcanoes Nationwide Park, Ocean Rider Seahorse Farm, Kona Espresso Excursions and poolside rest prime the listing, adopted by a manta ray presentation and the standard PADI Membership welcome dinner and raffle.
15 Dives in 4 Days
Hawaii is a world-class diving vacation spot, with wholesome corals, lava formations, plentiful wildlife, and 80 to 100-foot (24 to 30-meter) visibility on common. Our dive itinerary with Jack’s Diving Locker features a two-tank dive every morning and an alternating manta dive or blackwater dive every night time.
Turtle Heaven, Backyard Eel Cove, and Suck’em Up Lava Tube are amongst dozens of dive websites stretching alongside the western Hawaii shoreline, providing limitless potential for journey. On our second day of diving, we get an sudden whitetip reef shark photograph op whereas ready exterior Suck’em Up Cavern, aptly named for the timing required to exit the cavern with the outgoing surge. Colourful sponges line the partitions and the ceiling of the cavern. And, upon exiting Cranium Cave, we spend round 20 minutes within the firm of three curious whitetip reef sharks.
Jack’s boat captains and dive crew are first-class. Mongo’s pre-dive briefings alert us to his favourite resident critters at every dive web site, and dive guides Toby, Chris and Justin’s web site familiarity and expertise make every dive memorable. We’re rewarded on each dive with bucket listing marine wildlife sightings: rockmover wrasses, scrawled filefish, frogfish, Potter’s angelfish, flame angelfish, wire coral gobies, juvenile psychedelic wrasses, inexperienced sea turtles (honu), whitetip reef sharks, and a tiger shark named Laverne.
The Mantas, the Mantas, the Mantas!
Kona, Hawaii is known for espresso, and manta rays. Commonest in nearshore waters is Mobula alfredi, or reef manta, with big manta rays (Mobula birostris) making an occasional look. Our weeklong PADI Membership occasion started with a manta presentation by Keller Laros, Founder and Director of Manta Pacific Analysis Basis. Keller and his group have a long-standing relationship with these animals spanning 10 to 33 years; every manta is identifiable by spots on its ventral facet (underside). In case you add your Kona manta images to Manta Pacific’s web site, they’ll make it easier to establish it, and if it’s a manta that has by no means earlier than been documented, you possibly can identify it! Many divers opted in to get their Manta Ray Diver Distinctive Specialty certification this occasion.
A typical, two-tank manta dive begins with a pre-sunset dive in and across the manta viewing space or “campfire” and down a slope to 70 ft (21 meters). The reef mantas we’ll see on our dives with Jack’s Diving Locker vary from three to 12 ft (one to 4 meters) in “wing span”. 4 manta sightings on the primary dive portend the magic that’s to come back. After the solar goes down, it’s lights, digital camera, motion! After a quick descent to 30 ft (9 meters), divers type a circle round “the campfire”, and dive lights click on on to draw the plankton for mantas to feed. We settle in for the present. The mantas are swish, majestic, sentient beings. PADI Professional Brandon Zwirner stated it greatest, “It’s their world, and we’re simply blowing bubbles in it.”
Again at Honokohau Harbor, I hear Membership members say in the event that they don’t see anything the remainder of the week, they’ll be comfortable. For this reason they got here right here. One of the best half? You don’t should be an authorized diver to expertise the mantas at night time, snorkelers are welcome, too!
Let’s Go on a Pelagic Magic Evening Dive!
Does motoring three miles (5 kilometers) offshore and hovering over a 5,000-foot (1500-meter) drop at night time sound like your type of enjoyable? That is blackwater diving. The dive location or “abyss” chosen by Jack’s Diving Locker is a migratory path for myriad animals, some recognizable, others unworldly. Out in open ocean, we clip right into a line hooked up to the boat with a weight at 40 ft (12 meters) to forestall additional descent and the liberty to swim in a 360° circle. Our lights illuminate the inky blackness round us, and a weird however mesmerizing rotation of aquatic life begins. A tiny, translucent crab floats close to my face, a Venus Girdle shimmies close by, and colleges of squid jet via the water column. The sheer magnitude of life passing by is unfathomable; it’s throughout us. The Pelagic Magic dive is a rewarding, dreamlike expertise, an train for turning into extra snug within the open ocean at night time, and a bonus blackwater certification alternative for a lot of Membership members. Pattern the dive right here.
Take Your Expertise to the Subsequent Stage
Are you interested by assembly divers from around the globe, and increasing your dive abilities and information? Visitor audio system, skilled dive specialty instruction, and nature and wildlife training are an integral a part of each PADI Membership journey. Kona divers achieved certifications in Open Water Diver, Superior Open Water Diver, Enriched Air (Nitrox) Diver, and accomplished Manta Ray Diver Distinctive Specialty and blackwater diving programs. PADI AWARE Basis, Manta Pacific Analysis Basis, Keck Observatory, SeaLife Cameras, Andy Casagrande, and GoPro gave dynamic shows all week lengthy with time to ask all our burning questions.
The launch of the brand new GoPro PADI Distinctive Specialty course was an occasion spotlight. Its intention is to supply competent and expert GoPro content material creators above and beneath the water, and to empower storytellers to create, edit, and share their ardour with higher content material via the highly effective instruments within the GoPro Hero ecosystem. 4 GoPro group members and Emmy award-winning cinematographer Andy Casagrande carried out the programs, Q&A periods, and offered one-on-one assist aboard the dive boats with professional suggestions for capturing and filming. 9 divers accomplished this certification, and the content material the Kona divers produced was spectacular!
Be a part of Us on Our Subsequent PADI Membership Unique Member Occasion to La Paz, Mexico
Have you ever all the time needed to dive Mexico? Are you Enthusiastic about sea lions, sunken ships and assembly movie star friends? From the ocean lion colonies of Los Islotes to the Fang Ming and Salvatierra wrecks, there shall be no scarcity of fantastic experiences within the Sea of Cortez. The subsequent PADI Membership unique member occasion will happen in La Paz, Mexico in 12-19 October 2024
Be a part of us in La Paz with particular visitor and humanitarian Captain Jason Chambers from the hit actuality present Beneath Deck.
Keep in mind, you have to be a PADI Membership member to affix the occasion. So, click on the button beneath and begin your membership right now!
Associated Studying:
