Hawaii - Honolulu Day 2

A morning view of Waikiki Beach

I had only one thing booked/planned for Waikiki in this trip. That's a scuba diving trip on Saturday AM, that includes a free dive refresher course in Marriott hotel pool.
Ironically, I forgot to bring my Padi certified diver card and for some bizarre reason, they could not find me on the diver system.
Anyway, i was treated with some suspicion whether i lied about the certification but it all ended well once i'm in the water and they realize i know how to use the equpment and I can dive. But i'm quite happy with the suspicion as there's nothing scarier with going with a dive group who doesn't care who they bring into the ocean.

Anyway, the instructor is really good and entertaining during the refresher course (comments like "do not touch anything alive down in the ocean, which includes me. I do have a dive knife and i will stab you if u disturb me"). It's also a good refresher course for me as I haven't dived for 2 years.
I was worried that we will be diving with a bunch of non-divers which will slow us down. But there's a smaller group of 3 of us with a Dive Master that works out really well.

We went out in a really nice Catamaran boat that's configured for scuba diving and it's one of the best diving boat that i have been on. A Puerto Rican guy Jose (who is the other diver) kept getting his photos taken with me as the Dive Master thought we are there together. It's pretty funny.

Coral fishes are breath-takingly colorful with very unique lava coral. We saw crabs, sharks, moray eel and played for a long time with a cute octopus. The dive master took a digital camera with him and took lots of photos and even a couple of videos. I end up paying 35 bucks for the photos as i really wanted the memory of that octopus.




Getting Ready for First Dive




I'm doing OK





Cheesy Aloha rock at the bottom

 


Coral fishes




Crab hiding inside Coral




Playing with the little squid




School of fishes




More fishes




funny looking fish




Scary looking fish



My only regret is the rubbery air from breathing through the regulator still makes me nauseous. I was puking my guts out by the end of the 2nd dive. This made me reconsider my decision of going for another day of scuba diving, especially with the high price tag.

After the dive, I went back to the hotel room and had a nap. I walked around the Waikiki International market at night and saw a really nice sunset back ground with the Duke Statue.

Waikiki Sunset view