Hey baby!

Yesterday was a big disappointment.  When I got down to the beach, there was a swell.  It wasn’t real consistent, but there were some sets of waves that came five at a time and so I watched.  When I saw a guy coming in on a one man canoe….and get tossed by a shore break wave…I decided to stay on shore!  The wind had been threatening as well, so I went home.  I was happy about the wind, though, because I knew it would blow all the VOG away!  This morning the ocean looked a whole lot friendlier and there was just a hint of a breeze blowing from the south.  I was happy that I could see the island of Lanai today, but that was short-lived when I noticed a plume of cane smoke billowing up into the air!  Before long, the smoke had Lanai obscured from view again.  Luckily, the breeze stayed Kona and it wasn’t very long before the smoke blew out.  I hate cane smoke!  The conditions for paddling were great and I paddled down to the boat ramp.  I was the only one there initially, except for two swimmers,  and then a man and woman paddled up by me.  I was enjoying my first turtle and it had surfaced right by my board, but when the two paddlers moved in, I knew the turtle was going to panic.  Sure enough……it popped up and saw that it was surrounded on all sides….and dove down!  Then two more turtles surfaced to the north of me and so I paddled over.  The two paddlers also paddled over.  Then I spotted another turtle out farther so I paddled out.  The two paddlers also paddled out!  The turtle hung around for a few minutes and then it paddled right over by the woman paddler and I thought she was going to freak!  Then it dove down right in front of her.  Finally, the couple moved on and I had the turtles all to myself.  Three turtles surfaced and I paddled over in between them.  I stayed down at the boat ramp for quite a while and ended up with twelve turtles!  One of them was the friendly turtle I affectionately call “Spot”….. that has the reddish-brown markings on its shell.  That one came up a few times and at one point I paddled with it too,  when it was on the move!  The conditions stayed nice while I paddled back and when I was passing Kam II, I ran into a paddling friend.  We chatted for a few minutes and then we paddled together down by Charley Young Beach.  It turned out to be such a nice day!  Swimming was great too and the water was so clear.  I hope it’s nice tomorrow too!