Maui Dive Review - Mike Severns Diving

[jwmcq]

DH and I are novice divers so my goal for this dive was to have a really comfortable, non-scary dive experience. This was only my 8th open water dive so I am definitely still learning. Mike Severns was a great dive shop for me. Their briefings were incredibly thorough. Pauline (the owner) and Dan were our Divemasters, Pauline taking the experience group and Dan taking the novice group. The first dive was at Molikini Crater. I started the dive with 3100 psi and ended with 1200 (DH, by dive buddy, needs to get better with his air consumption!) Our dive was 38 minutes, but the experienced group went in before us and came up after us, so theirs was a much longer dive. We went to 71 ft, but spent the end of the dive at 40 ft. We ended the dive near the mooring line, so the pairs of divers could just go up when their air hit 700 psi. The entire group did not have to come up when one ran low. We were still within view of the DM as we went up. The highlight of this dive for me was that we could hear the whales singing throughout the dive. This was incredible! I also saw my first sharks, a pair of white tip baby sharks. Dan said they had been there about 3 months and had grown about 6 inches (they are now about 2 ½ feet long.) We saw a large green eel, many garden eels at the sandy bottom, and a pipe fish who was loaded with eggs (the males carry the eggs in this species.) We also spotted a scorpion fish and a sponge crab. At the surface interval there was an enormous full rainbow over Maui. We saw many whales playing during the surface interval. The second dive was at Deer Valley. We saw another eel, a leaf fish, and could only occasionally hear the whale song. This dive also lasted 38 minutes (but the more experienced divers dove longer.) Pauline and Dan were very enjoyable and educational. They were perfect for novice and experienced divers alike. Price was $130, with equipment rentals $5 each. We took our own gear, except for the wet suits which we rented thicker wet suits for the cool Pacific ocean.