Having both completed our main crossings, we’ve been looking at the many other touristy things to do on Maui. We both like water based activities and were considering snorkelling/diving/whale watching cruises. And then we thought, why not do another crossing?
Our skipper from the previous trips, Jim Dickson, was happy to oblige, so yesterday we swam from Maui to Lanai across the Auau Channel. The swim we did saw us depart the main tourist area of Kaanapali beach at 8.30am. For a change, the weather was great, slightly overcast with a very light tailwind, and only a slight head current as we approached Lanai.
Lanai must be a beautiful place, because Bill Gates (microsoft) chose it to use for his wedding in 1994. The story goes that to ensure privacy, he booked every hotel room on the island, and then left all of them empty, except for invited guests. And then, he chartered every helicopter on Maui and paid them to stay on the ground, so as not to have any uninvited guests. The thought came to me as we were swimming across, that we have found a way to gatecrash any future celebrity weddings on Lanai.
Our swim was exactly the same as the Maui Channel Swim, except we headed in the opposite direction. Curiously, whilst lots of people go from Lanai to Maui, only three people before us have ever swum from Maui to Lanai.
With Penny and I in the water, our support crew consisted of Jim as skipper and Rob Knake as deckie/feeder. The start and finish took us over some nice fringing reef, which was good. On this swim, we saw lots of jellyfish and received lots of tiny stings. Nothing bad or painful, just a bit of an itch. Water temperature was 72F (22C) and swimming conditions were ideal. Hawaiin open water swimmers have it sooooo good.
We were hoping to encounter some humpback whales on the way across. Once again we didn’t see any, but at one point we swam through some disturbed water, which would indicate one must have just been out of visibility range. The guys on the boat told us after they were just everywhere, and sure enough on the boat ride back, they certainly were.
Our swim of 9.98 miles took us 4 hours 31 minutes. Penny and I swam together and we were the fourth and fifth people (first Australians) to swim from Maui to Lanai.