Two Step Turtles

What snorkeling adventure would be complete without eyeballing a turtle.  These are green sea turtles, honu in Hawaiian.  They will cruise through the blue waters to visit the various cleaning stations made available by the local reef fish.  Then ride the waves into the rocky shoreline looking for a decent patch of algae to munch on.  It's really interesting watching them navigate the waves and tidal surges to keep their beaks in position to make that strike at their salad.



Cruising above the coral on the lookout for a good salad.

It is fairly common to see a turtle along the Hawaiian coast.  They don't hesitate to occupy the same snorkeling spot with the tourist and locals alike.  Today this young turtle, in the video below, decided to follow us or we inadvertently picked the same snorkeling path.  We went from the Two Step entry point around to the north point of the bay and back.  The turtle would show up along our side periodically as if to check out if we had found anything good.  Most of the time one turtle looks like all the others, but our snorkel buddy had a small hole in the side of his shell.

A day of turtle watching.  He watched us as we watched him.