Hanauma Bay

*Disclaimer: I have been very blessed and am fortunate to have visited and seen many amazing underwater environments and have interacted with the marine life there.  As such, I am a bit spoiled in what I consider a great snorkeling or scuba location.*

Hanauma Bay is another one of those names that most of us have heard over time from magazines or people that have visited Hawaii.  It's usually a hot spot with tourists and occasionally hard to get into (there are a limited number of parking spots available and once full, they close the road to vehicle traffic).

After finishing at Diamond Head, Kathryn, we continued east to Hanauma Bay.  I think we timed it right going after lunch, because the morning crowd seemed to be leaving and making room in the parking lot.  We stood in line to get our tickets to enter (I think it was $7 or something like that) and then you wait in a line to see a video about Hanauma Bay.  I think it's good to have this because with the amount of traffic the area gets, it would be easy to cause a lot of damage.  They basically say "don't stand on the reef, don't try to catch the sea life, don't be stupid, etc.".  My gripe with the video is that they lead you to believe you're going to see a lot of things (the video shows turtles, eels, octopus, and tons of fish), which increased the let-down for us.

I hate to say it, but we were very disappointed with our overall experience.  It was EXTREMELY crowded (the guy checking our things into a locker said that day was the busiest he had seen it in 4 months), the visibility was poor in the water, there wasn't much to see fish-wise, and it was shallow (that may have been on us, I forgot to check the tide charts).  It was so shallow that we kept banging our knees on the reef and rocks as we were swimming across.  The surf was a little rougher that day, so I'm guessing that had to do with the visibility being stirred up, but once we made our rounds side-to-side, Kathryn and I were both ready to go.

In talking to other people, Hanauma Bay does have it's better days, but it's nothing like it was before the 80s and 90s.  Poor protection of the fish, animals, and reefs has led to a decreased abundance in what used to be the top spot for snorkeling.  With the number of people it draws daily, it does not suprise me that there is little marine life still hanging around.  When they created the visitor center, started charging, and requiring people to watch a video, the idea was to create a better educated tourist and help protect the area, but I think it was too little, too late.

We were told you can also scuba in Hanauma Bay, but I'm hoping they were talking about the area out closer to the ocean because it's so shallow I'm not sure why you would need to in the area we were in.

I'll definitely give Hanauma Bay another shot when we have more visitors that want to check it out, but I will be sure to check the tide charts before we go and try very hard to avoid going on a weekend.