Kahului, Maui

After a long hike yesterday to the top of Diamond Head, we were happy to have a later start this morning.

Whale watching was our plan for today.

We signed up for the Holland America Zodiac Whale Watching Tour from Maalaea harbor, about 10 miles south of Kahului where we moored at 8 AM.

Here is the crew mounting the Welcome Home Sign – from the ship and the wharf.

WHALE WATCHING

The HAL tour is operated by Maui Reef Adventures.  Their price is $75 if you directly book vs $179 thru HAL.  Keep in mind that the HAL tour included transportation to and from the ship.  Taxi or Uber Fare would be about $30-$40 each way.  However, on cruise ship days, the ship will book all the capacity, so you don’t have any other options if you want to go with Maui Reef Adventures.  There are other Whale Watching tours available for similar prices if you shop around.

Here is the tour description on the HAL website:

Whale Watching Adventure by Zodiac

Departs: 12:15 PM – Approximately 3½ Hours Price $179.95

A truly magical experience, this small-group whale-watch tour offers an up-close experience viewing humpback whales away from other tour boats.

Your tour begins with 45-minute motorcoach journey to Ma’alaea Harbor to board the sightseeing vessel.  The exhilarating, fast-paced Zodiac travels along Maui’s scenic sea cliffs for a two-hour whale-watch experience.  You may be lucky enough to see tail slaps, waving fins and awe-inspiring full body breaches.  Your Zodiac allows for an intimate view of these gentle giants.  Seasoned guides educate guests about whale behavior and migration.  Each boat is equipped with an onboard hydrophone to allow you to listen below the surface as whales communicate with each other and their newborn calves.  After the trip, a motorcoach returned us to the ship in Kahului.

Notes:  Minimum age is 5 years.  Pregnant woman and guests with back and neck conditions are not allowed to participate.  The boat is not accessible for guests using a wheelchair.  Bring a light jacket or windbreaker.  Wear your swimsuit under your clothing; bring a towel, reef-safe/biodegradable sunscreen and a hat.  Wildlife sightings are likely but are not guaranteed.

The Maui cruise terminal is an empty warehouse with a few chairs inside and a place for security.  There aren’t any shops or vendors.

Outside the cruise terminal, you will find taxi stands in addition to some partitions marked with numbers where the tours will assemble prior to departure.  Holland America staff, with clipboards, directed us to departure stall number one.  The excursion tickets are now on our smartphone in the navigator app and they scanned our barcode once we entered the waiting area.

Masks are required on the Holland America tour buses.  We left on time and arrived in Maalaea Harbor 20 minutes later.

After a short walk to the end of the pier, we signed another release form and boarded the 25 person zodiac boat.  The boat is 60 feet long and powered by four, 350 hp Yamaha V-8 engines.

As we boarded, people scrambled for what appeared to be the more desirable seats up front, out in the open, which we all assumed would have better views.  The Captain kept reminding us to sit anywhere as all seats were good.  As we were the last to board, we ended up being separated into center seats.  We were a little concerned at first, but once we left the harbor we were allowed to stand up and sit on the edge of the boat.  As it turned out no one sat on the seats in the center of the boat.  Everyone walked around the edges of the boat as the tour progressed.  The seats toward the front, which initially appeared to be more desirable, were actually more exposed to the wind, weather and sea spray so were actually less desirable.

The tour description advised us to wear swimsuits under our clothes implying that we might get wet.  We brought plastic bags to protect our cameras and phones, but it turned out to not be necessary.  There was a few instances of spray coming into the boat but if your phone was protected by an ordinary bag or in your pocket it would be fine.  The plastic bag would offer another layer of protection in case there was a more intense spray.  The crew gave us warnings prior to any maneuvers which may result in sea spray entering the boat.  Complimentary soft drinks were available on the Zodiac.

We raced out of the harbor at high speed, about 30 knots, and then would coast to a stop if the captain observed whales nearby.  While we never saw any whales closer than 50 yards and most were beyond 100 yards, we did see a few tails and some breaches as the whales broke the surface.  Our best bet for photography was to shoot 4K video and hope we captured a frame to enlarge later.

The Zodiac was smooth when running at high speed with only minimum bumpiness over the water.  This will vary a lot based on the prevailing sea state on the day of your tour.

After about an hour of darting back and forth across the harbor, we paused for a second and listened to whale sounds that were picked up by the hydrophone lowered in the water.

We spent 90 minutes on the water looking for whales before we headed back to our berth.

Here is my video review

Twenty minutes later we are back at the ship, three hours total time from when we started.  By the time we got back, security in the terminal was closed so the ship assumed responsibility for running the metal detectors.

MAUI MALL

The Maui Mall was half a mile from the ship, and we headed there after a brief rest to check out the stores.  There is a Longs Drugstore and a Whole Foods Market so you should find pretty much anything you may need.

French Polynesia required a PCR test for entry so this afternoon we went down to the Hudson room once again to get our 4^th COVID test.  We think this will be the last one as we are only visiting French Polynesia on this cruise, albeit on many different islands.  PCR test results take up to 12 hours, so we were not required to sit by the phone in our room.  They would come to track us down if we tested positive.  We would know prior to our arrival in Hilo tomorrow.

RUDI’S SEL DE MER

Tonight in the Pinnacle was the pop-up version of Rudi’s Sel de Mer which is a permanent restaurant on the Pinnacle Ships.  They use the same plates and menus and they try to recreate the same experience as best they can.  We enjoy Rudi’s and we had a wonderful time this evening.

BLUE PLANET

Tonight in the World Theatre, they showed the movie Blue Planet accompanied by live music from the Lincoln Center Group.  It’s well-produced and a nice movie and the musical accompaniment is excellent.