Jason in the shuttle to the snorkel tour, run by Trilogy.
We left from the Manele harbor that we hiked to earlier.
On the boat, the Trilogy VI, Captain Brian is giving instructions as to how not to fall in.
A view of Sweetheart Rock, which we saw on the beach day, this time looking south/southwestish.
A view of the front of the boat -- if you wanted to get spashed, you sat on those tarp things.
Once we came around this point with the lighthouse on it,
there were these beatiful sea-cliffs, located on the west-facing portion of the southwest part of the island. Our destination, shark-fin rock, is sticking out just bottom-left of center.
Here is shark-fin rock up-close (at right). We snorkeled for about an hour, orbiting sharkfin rock twice counterclockwise. Next is one of the lifeguards, with giant foam surfboard, and another group of snorkelers behind in the inflatable, to the left of the rock. Gwen below seacliffs, at left.
Gwen and the sea-cliffs.
Jason and the shark fin.
Houlopo`e Bay from the west.
On the way back, we saw a huge fleet of maybe a hundred dolphins! Here two of them jump out of the water together.
Here they are swimming along with our boat.
Peacefully swimming under the water.
They were everywhere.
Two jump out of the water and spin around! Peacefulness of the situation declines as a big boat full of ecotourists arrives, and one of their member starts screaming uncontrollably.
Annoying ecotourist boat is on the right. Maui in background.
A nice fellow snorkeler took a picture of the both of us.
So. Despite repeated attempts to secure a rental Jeep, they were all booked. Jason started inquiring only a week before the trip, which evidently was too late. Since most of the roads on the island are dirt, and many of those 4x4 only, we were constrained in what we could see. On the last day, desperate, we sought out compromise solutions. We found: scooters. Vespas. Like we were in Rome or something. Well, we took them. Definitely not the stylish way to go around, there, but effective and kinda fun.
First we went to see the Garden of the Gods, on the northwest end of the island's spine, and 8 miles or so down a dirt road.
Panorama of Garden of the Gods. Strangely spheroidal basalt at left, Gwen at far left, beautiful shot of Molokai and ocean downrange right.
A second panorama, from Gwen's camera.
Lots of crazy erosion features.
The dirt road was great -- but a little steep and rocky for scooters.
Next we backtracked down the dirt road back to the Lodge, and then headed north, over the ridgeline, and then scootered down towards shipwreck beach. Here we've made it down to the beach. Sand, with relatively thinly layered basalt at the beach. Layers are tilting.
We put sunscreen on partway through the scooter ride. Then the oily stuff just collected dirt like the lint guard in your dryer, as you can see from Gwen's face.
Reefs off the coast keep the waves small here.
10X optical and 4X digital zoom of some crabs out in the water.
Waves washing over the crabs.
Lots of stuff washes up here, and its so remote that nobody's bothered to clean it out.
The beach was covered in these mounds, next to little burrows.
Around the bend, we saw hundreds of crabs running into the ocean to get away from us! They must be making the mounds!
Zoom of the shipwreck.
Jason eclipses the Sun so as to allow the camera to snare the shipwreck, outlined on the horizon in the distance.
Gwen with some washed-up corals that we found.
The shiprwreck from partway up the coast, just after sunset.