Who to Take to Hawaii? Mary Ann or Ginger?

                                         

You know the story.  You are going out on a three hour, oh let's say, boat tour to see whales.  Who would you take?

Well, if you are Tall Guy, you would take Ginger.  Yep, the cute little farm gal would be left behind but NOT in favor of the more glamorous Tina Louise.  His new friend comes in the form of little candy pieces or the candied version of the dried real plant.  Unfortunately, he didn't meet his new friend until we went to Maui, so he only had his cute farm girl and his C-bans (that have worked in the past by applying pressure to points on his wrists) with him on the boat to see the whales, and that wasn't enough to keep his motion sickness at bay (pardon the pun!)

The cool part of this story was as soon as we landed in Honolulu, we heard reports that a momma humpback and her calf had been spotted in Honolulu Harbor, which was kind of unusual.  We had actually seen them from our balcony, but they were about a mile out.  You really can see the spouts of water come up, and you have to curb your urge to say, "Thar she blows!"  Maybe only English teachers think that way??  Thanks Mr. Melville!

So while TG was sitting down on the first deck in the middle of the boat praying that the ride would end, I was up top watching for whales. Sigh.....  He did make it up top in the beginning, and all seemed well until we had our first siting, and everyone AND the boat shifted to the appropriate side.  Now this WAS a big boat, but apparently when you suffer from this motion sickness, size doesn't matter; it really is the motion on the ocean.  Poor guy!  He really was a trooper because he knew seeing whales was on my Bucket List. 

I have to say I was a tad disappointed that the whales did not see fit to breach, you know jump up and wave at me.  National Geographic pictures and documentaries spoil us.  I did see a lot of whale tales, but I made the decision to leave my big camera at home in favor of my Canon G9 that fit so nicely in my purse.  Here is what I did manage to capture.

The Boat for our Three Hour Tour.  Way bigger than Gilligan's!

A view of the coral from the dock.  Yep, the water was that clear!

The shore line of Honolulu

 Diamond Head in the distance

 Our hotel, the Sheraton Waikiki, is the tall tan building.  The smaller pink building is the Royal Hawaiian, second oldest hotel on the island.

"Thar She Blows!"

If I had to give advice, and I knew you were also going to Maui, I would tell you to wait and go on a whale watch tour at Maui.  There were many more sightings, and those who went said the humpback whales came very close to the boats.  Because humpback whales are protected, the boats are to stay 100 yards away from these big mammals, but you can't help where they come up and surface.  November through April are their prime time in the warm Island waters to mate and give birth, so plan accordingly.

Again, big hugs to Tall Guy for toughing it out.  It meant a lot to me that he came out on the water to see the whales with me.