Night of The Manta Ray

As indicated in the last post, our swimming adventures were over for the day - but not for the night! That's right, after an afternoon nap, we returned to the same marina to jump on a different boat and go night diving with manta rays! This time, we were actually on Neptune Charlie's boat and had a somewhat larger crowd of 8 tourists. Still, it was less than 1/2 the normal number of people for a dive (Thank goodness because the boat can handle 19 at a time).

As we left the harbor, the sun was already setting. Our destination was a place where several boats gather each night to try to attract manta rays (remember, they are wild animals and don't have to show). Turns out, the location is the same place we swam with the dolphins, but this time, the blue water was black!

Our companions hailed from all over and our guides were friendly. Donning our wet suits, we listened to the instructions and prepped our flashlights for the dive. Then it was as simple as a jump into the water and start swimming around our pink, floatable hula-hoop. As we held on to the hoop, it helped concentrate our light in one place, encouraging the manta rays to come visit.

So imagine 10 people floating around a giant hula hoop in dark water trying to keep their underwater flashlights pointed down waiting for giant sea creatures to come swimming up from the depths and you'll have a rough mental picture of the situation. Manta Rays eat plankton. So while we were certainly a tasty bunch, we weren't on the menu for the evening. Plankton are attracted to light and so when the lights are out, the plankton gather and the manta rays feast. As they feast, we get a close up view!

Almost as soon as we began jumping in, a manta ray came up to investigate our light! It was "Lefty" (all manta rays have unique markings, but Lefty's front fin-thing is broken so he's easy to spot.) As he approached, he swooped upside down and made several circles, getting closer and closer! Eventually, he swam away into the darkness. At this point there were only a few of us in the water, so it looked like a good night was ahead!

The group swam away from the boat to hover over a large group of scuba divers huddled around powerful lights on the bottom. So in this space we had divers on the bottom and snorkelers on the surface with manta rays in the middle. It was non-stop swooping and swimming - very exciting to watch. I spent most of my time trying to keep my camera from getting in the way when the manta rays came so close that they touched you!

The manta rays were so big that it was hard to get a full picture of them - we got a lot of shots straight down the mouth! But as interesting as these pictures are, I got a few really great movies where you can see how the manta rays moved and came so close to us!

This movie shows a couple of manta rays swooping to gather up plankton. You can see how close they get! I had to move my camera to keep from bumping them, but they didn't have any problem flapping against us!

In this movie, you can see how close the manta rays get to us and to each other. They seemed to swarm but they seldom ran into each other. It was an underwater dance with creatures that spanned from 8 feet across to as large as 12 feet across!


Eventually, there were many manta rays between the divers and the snorkelers! Some counted 10, but I thought there were 12 manta rays. Our guide was astounded at the number of manta rays that night! He said it was very rare to see that many.


I was the last one in the water, still watching the manta rays below me as everyone climbed on board the boat! It was a great way to end a fabulous day in Hawaii - but of course we had one more day to go.... and one more night!