Maui. Day 3.

Today was pretty much a go to the beach day on the west coast of Maui. The first stop was to rent snorkel gear in Kihei. From there we headed south to Po’olenalena Beach (aka. Paipu, Pepeiaolepo, Loves, or Keauhou Beach). This was a nice little beach with small waves but pretty good snorkeling. We saw some cool looking fish, a lot of bleached corral, and a sea turtle. In papers I’ve read and lectures I’ve been too there has been a lot of discussion of ocean warming and acidification having adverse affects on corral reefs. This area was a sad example of what climate change is doing to our oceans. When Janel and I were on the Big Island seven years ago for honeymoon I recall that the corral we saw was alive and well with lots of colors. On the Maui coast that was not the case. I’d like to revisit some of the spots we snorkeled in on the Big Island again and see how they are doing.

After some time at Po’olenalena we headed further south to check out Makena Beach (aka. Oneloa Beach or Big Beach) and Pu’u Ola’I Beach (aka. Little Beach). We first headed over to Pu’u Ola’I Beach. Pu’u Ola’I Beach is a garment optional beach and was very crowded with scenery that was not particularly pleasing to the eye. So, we headed back over the knoll to Makena (Big) Beach, which was much less crowded. Big Beach got its name from hippies back in the 60s and 70s that kept things simple and called it was it was (a big beach) instead of calling it by its Hawaiian name, Makena. Makena is about a half-mile long and quite beautiful. The surf here was much bigger than at Po’olenalena and the snorkeling off shore was OK. After we snorkeled for a while, Janel headed in while I stayed in for a while and worked on my body surfing technique. Once I had taken enough abuse we sat on the beach for a while before deciding to call it a day.

Before heading back to town we drove to the end of the west coast road to La Pérouse Bay, where there is a very large lava field. The road here was quite narrow. There were occasional homes on the beach that looked like nice, simple places to live with a spectacular view. The sunset was pretty good.

Pictures from today can be found here.