Okay, okay, we weren't really snorkeling with Captain Cook, after all, he has been dead for over 200 years. We did, however, snorkel at the only British-owned piece of land in America: the monument erected to mark the place where Cook was killed by native Hawaiians.
This spot on the other side of Kealakekua Bay from where we're staying is the most amazing place I've ever snorkeled. The array of fish is vast in both sheer numbers and numbers of species, the water is always calm, and the water clarity is always good. My only disappointment was that I failed to get a waterproof camera before I left home so I wasn't able to get any photos of the fish.
With the ban on kayaks in the bay, we went to the monument on one of the commercial snorkel cruises. We've done this before - it's always fun.
Going out on a boat like the Fairwind also gave us a chance to see humpback whales and a large pod of spinner dolphins (Nai'a in Hawaiian). My attemps to video the dolphins were mediocre at best, but Thane did get a photo of what appears to be a humpback cow with a calf.
Part of the reason the Fairwind is so much fun is that it has two slides that end in a six-foot or so fall into the water. After an hour of snorkeling and lunch, we took advantage of the opportunity to just play. Mom took lots of photos of us all since she doesn't do the water thing. Thanks for sharing your photos, Mom!
This evening, we enjoyed another of our favorite pastimes - watching geckos. Thane managed to get one of the non-native species to jump onto his arm. It then proceeded to crawl all over him in protest to us trying to take its picture.
We also found a little baby gecko. This darling was only about an inch long. It doesn't even have a proper tail yet. I'm not sure if it's one of the non-native ones that hasn't yet turned green, or if it's a native brown gecko. Either way, it's cute. Rowan managed to catch it somehow, so I was able to get a good photo of it.
