The Star Princess: Tuesday, September 29, 2009

We were up early today as we had a tour which started at 8am. We had arrived in Lahaina, Maui, Hawaii. We had arranged to take a snorkel tour which also included breakfast and lunch. We had to take tenders (small lifeboats) to shore as the water in the port was too shallow - our cruise ship had anchored offshore earlier in the morning. There were 67 passengers in total on this cruise. The boat had three levels - downstairs, rear deck and upstairs. We chose to sit on the rear deck as it was outside but shaded. Our breakfast consisted of fresh fruit, muffins and juice. We had about an hour’s ride to our first snorkel stop. The captain (a young girl) of the boat gave a little commentary about some of the places we were seeing along the way. We were given a life jacket, snorkel gear and flippers. We spent an hour snorkelling amongst the tropical fish and coral reef. The fish were plentiful and colourful. The most amazing part to us was that they were swimming right amongst us and didn’t seem worried about us being so close to them. I found that it’s harder to breathe normal when you have a snorkel on and so it was hard for me to keep it on for any length of time. We spent some time just enjoying the water on a swimming noodle. On the way to the next snorkelling stop, we had a barbecue lunch which consisted of hamburgers, hot dogs, a pasta salad, chips and drink. There was plenty of food to go around and it was quite tasty. Our second snorkel stop was about 45 minutes from our first snorkel stop. When we got there, we were able to snorkel and see green sea turtles. Again we were amazed by the fact that they didn’t seem to care that we were swimming with them. We were told not to touch them at all as they were protected by the government. They would stay at the bottom of the water but occasionally had to come up to the top to take a breath. One time when we were watching one, he/she came so close to us that we actually had to folded my arms against myself so that I wouldn’t touch it- that was such an amazing experience to be up so close and personal with the turtles. On the way back to the dock, we had some chocolate chip cookies and drinks to end our cruise. We thoroughly enjoyed our time on this boat (the Island Princess).

When we got back to the dock, we walked a block or so and bought some t-shirts for the grandsons and then got into a long line to get back on a tender to go back to the cruise ship. By this time Lahaina was feeling the effects of an earthquake which had occurred in the South Pacific. The resulting tsunami which devastated Samoa, also caused large sea surges in the harbour of Lahaina and so we had to wait for quite a while until the tenders were allowed to come in to pick us up. It also caused great difficulty getting off the tender as at times the tender was rising and falling about 4 feet.

When we got back to our cabin, I asked Mike to check my back as it was starting to hurt a little. It turned out that I had a wicked sunburn. I had thought about putting on sunscreen on the boat, but had thought that since I would be in the water for most of the day or under the shade on the boat, that I would not need it. Silly me - I had forgotten that when you snorkel you spend most of your time on your front and therefore the back is exposed to the sun. Between that and the fact that I had felt a little seasick onboard the boat (I had taken a Dramamine towards the end of the cruise, but still felt a little wiped out), we decided that after dinner, we would forgo the night time show (a comedian) and just hang out in the cabin. We watched a little tv, but I was so tired that I fell asleep just after 8pm.