NaPali Snorkeling

As mentioned in the post about our NaPali boat ride, the far end of the tour stopped for an hour or so to enjoy the snorkeling.  The only way to get to these reefs are by boat.  Because the beach is a preserve area, the boats can only anchor in the bay.  Very few boats, with a small maximum of passengers, are granted permits to dock at the beach.  The snorkeling here was excellent.  For the second time in three days I got to swim with sea turtles.  I was snorkeling with a GoPro Hero2.  The Hero2 (GoPro HD HERO2 Outdoor Edition) is an HD underwater/sports utility camera that takes pictures and does video.  I had it strapped to my chest and the pictures didn't really return much but I put together two videos: of turtles and of other things.

Ke'e Beach - Swimming with Turtles

Before I went to Hawaii the one thing that I knew I wanted to do there was swim with sea turtles.  I got to do it twice!  The first time was at Ke'e Beach located in Haena Park.  Haena is a beautiful park on the northwest side of Kauai.  It is at the end of the highway coming from the north side of the island.  There is 20 or so miles of unsettled land afterwards along the Na Pali coast.  At Ke'e beach there is a coral reef that makes great snorkeling.

I snorkeled by myself for an hour or so.  After 15 or 20 minutes I came across sea turtles and was able to observe, photograph and video them all alone.  They were grazing on coral in water that was <1' to 2' deep.  After awhile I brought back Elise and her sisters to see the turtles as well.  All of these pictures were taken with our underwater camera; it was definitely worth purchasing for this experience.  The settings are much more restricted on this camera and I had no idea how any came out until I got home.

School of fish I came across before the turtles.

I got lucky and managed to get four of the five turtles in this shot
(and some other fish photobombing).

The turtle in action.

Caught one in eating.

Elise and her sister observing my new friend turtles.
The turtles were hanging next to me, which made it easy to snag this picture.

Special bonus in this post - our first ever video!  I was even more skeptical at how these would come out, but again they were great.  I was being tossed about in the waves so it is a little jolty.  I spliced together several different clips that I took, including one with Elise examining the turtle.

n.b. the video can be enlarged to full screen by clicking the lower right.