I guess I really wanted to go!

Because I have a haircut at 9 tomorrow, there was no chance to swim beforehand.  Church on Sunday, so ditto.  I like to swim early before everyone and their mother gets in the water.  Thinking that's a selfish attitude, but my neck gets cricked when I have to look down, then up, then above the waves to check for others.  Not a great reason, but here's another: the octopus can be skittish; I have begun to learn to swim like a Ninja: no one sees me move on my appointed rounds! So when the impediments to swimming started to arise, I went above and beyond to be a dutiful swimmer.  Yeah, I'm all about sacrificing for others.  LOL

And the good news is that it worked: I discovered 3 octopuses today! YAY!  
Here is #1:

You can see how well they do with camouflage. There's a rock, a rock and an octopus. They do wait, tucked away, until they need to do something. I haven't seen any that hunt during the day here, but I know of a few who did on Oahu, so perhaps someday they will branch out.  If I were an octopus, I'd hunt at night too, as there are too many people who might interrupt me during the day at such a visitor destination.

Here is #2:

 You can see its eye at the bottom of the photo.  They stayed all tucked in today.  There was a bit of color movement (from brown/white to that dark brown color you see above..) But not much actual body movement.  I twinkled my fingers at them all, but there wasn't an answering response...ha.  I do not want to train them to respond to divers...that could be deadly for the octopus.  They are allowed to be hunted in this part of the ocean, as it's not protected as Hanauma Bay is on Oahu.  Too bad! So, don't tell anyone where these were, please!

Here is #3:

 If you click on the photos, you can see the eye.  For #3, on the right side.  That's part of the challenge of finding octopuses: you can see brown in a hole, and it might be a sea cucumber.   








And speaking of a challenge, here's Eagle Eye Challenge for today:

 See it?  When I tell you it's a Devil Scorpion Fish, does that help?

This little guy was probably only 6 inches long, all told.  I only saw it (and thank God!) because it moved.  The water was so shallow that I worried I would have to bump into it.  Thankfully, I didn't.  But I did have this picture in my mind that there could be a Scorpion Fish hanging off of my trash bags.  I keep two dive bags on my waist while swimming: one for the backup camera and one for trash. (You'd be amazed what I pick up: broken glass, rubber parts of dive shoe, paper towels.  I've even found dental bridges!  Yeah, how hard would it be to know that you lost one of those?!  And glasses.  I once saw a man standing on the bottom in Hanauma Bay: when I asked, he said "I've lost my glasses!!!"  I completely understood: how do you look for something when it's your glasses that you've lost?  I did find them for him. Oh and then there was the time I found someone's I-phone...and it was ringing.  Can you believe?  I wasn't about to have my dive ruined by having to go in to the beach, so I kept it in my trash bag...and it kept ringing.  HAHA. Found out later it was the owner calling the phone...But I digress.....)

I should have told you that it was raining lightly when I arrived a bit later at the beach today (7:30 a.m.).  This because I left home later, but also there had been an auto accident.  So we were diverted along the bypass road, which Thank God, there is one!  Since we are kind of a one-road-island, when one road is blocked, it can be really disconcerting.  Not to mention tempting to use bad words.  All that to say, here's what I saw out at sea when I arrived:

Rain. Pretty, isn't it?  Even prettier was the rainbow later...

 See it just under the clouds? Faint, but there.  There were lots of surfers out when I got in, but I was the only one snorkeling: score!!!!  Didn't last long, but I did feel great to be slipping around unaccompanied.  And yes, it is stupid to do this: what if something happened?  But in my defense, there were people on the beach.  They might have responded to a shout.  Here's hoping I never need to find out.

I alluded yesterday to the Yellow Tail Coris.  The juvenile and the adult are so different, it amazes me that they could be related.  See what you think:

Now, here's the adult:

I agree, you might need to click on it.  But it looks almost like a totally different fish! Incroyable!


Our power just went out and was then restored.  Just in case, I'll sign off now...perhaps I'll finish today's dive report over the next few days, since I probably won't be able to swim...
Aloha!