Day 2 — Aug 18: 5am start time. After breakfast and packing lunch to take with us, the team loaded up the vans and headed to the north shore of the island to begin a “shake down” collecting day at Hale’iwa. Water conditions were good for snorkeling, so the totes, floats and gear were taken down to the beach — let the collecting begin! Many of the fish we were looking for are found around Hale’iwa — tangs, butterfly fish, wrasses and goatfish. After two and half hours we had gathered 19 of the fish on our wish list.
We needed to be back in Honolulu by 1:30pm in order to receive a shipment of packing boxes. So, we loaded up our finds and made the hour drive back south. Kathryn and Alan took our catch to Waikiki Aquarium while Bryan, Andy and Roberta unloaded and cleaned up the snorkel/collecting equipment and waited for the delivery of the packing/shipping supplies.
We met our first family of guest collectors (supporters who bought the SPLASH 2011 auction item to join us on the trip) at Dukes on Waikiki for dinner at 6:45pm. We got acquainted and spent some time discussing plans and logistics for the next day and the rest of the week. It was decided that we would be collecting at Hale’iwa again in the morning and that the guest collectors would meet us there when they were ready.
We had a very nice dinner and our guest collectors are very enthusiastic and eager to begin helping with the collection.
Day 3 — Aug 19: 5am start time. Andy’s back was giving him some trouble and it was decided he should opt-out of collecting today. We packed lunches, gear and enthusiasm and headed to Hale’iwa (North Shore) for a full day of collecting. The Aquarium team was in the water by 8:30am. The guest collectors joined us around 10:30am. Although the water was a little murky, we had good success finding fish.
More butterfly fish, tangs and wrasses were gathered to add to the collection. Our guest collectors did very well on their first day, even catching fish on their own. We wrapped up the snorkeling at 1pm and inventoried and loaded the fish. (We added 24 fish to the coffers today) Kathryn and Bryan took the cargo van to Waikiki Aquarium to deliver our catch for the day. Alan and Roberta made the trip around the north/east side of the island to assess conditions, other collection sights and to stop by a local fish farm to check out their set-up.
We ate lunch in the van after leaving Hale’iwa. Kathryn and Bryan delivered the fish, then returned to the house and cleaned up the gear. Andy had dinner ready when we all got back. We updated our fish inventory and strategized for the next few days of collecting, to optimize our time and to get the types of fish we need. The day ended around 10pm and everyone was ready for bed.
Another collecting day to come!