Washington Post Shares the Stoke
We relish good feedback. Trip Advisor, Facebook, Yelp, you name it, we’re stoked each and every time we get a 5 star review. We love what we do and our guests that make it possible, so it’s important to us that we do a good job. There are a number of things that set us apart as a company, namely our trip size and fact that we sail. There is no shortage of sailing excursions on Maui. Many will never know or appreciate the difference between our high performance catamarans and those designed for maximum accommodation. It’s because of this that we savor reviews like this one, from someone who gets it and values what we’re about. Even more so that this recommendation comes straight from the travel section of Washington Post, one of our very favorite publications and an authority on travel. Can we take that in for a moment? WASHINGTON POST just endorsed Sail Maui!
Below is an excerpt that is both incredibly humorous and incredibly true. The author’s experience is not an anomaly at Molokini, and we’re pretty happy to have been named as the antidote! Find the original posting here.
All to ourselves
Maui’s Molokini Crater: Like snorkeling in a packed aquarium
“According to Hawaiian legend, Maui’s Molokini Crater is the tail of a lizard whose body was cut in half by the goddess Pele. I imagine in the future, the story will be that this half-sunken caldera was engineered by the Hawaii Tourism Authority to resemble a set of arms thrown wide open toward Maalaea Bay, welcoming ships full of tourists.
Nearly half a million visitors snorkel and scuba dive at the crater each year, lured by the promise of calm, crystalline waters with visibility often exceeding 150 feet. Once used for bomb practice by the U.S. military, this designated Hawaii Marine Life Conservation District is now home to some 250 fish species and 38 coral species. Snorkeling there, protected from wind and waves, you feel like you’re in an aquarium, albeit one packed with other observers. At least half a dozen boats, some with as many as 140 passengers, moor off the crescent-shaped crater. For every rainbow-hued parrotfish chomping on cauliflower coral, there is at least one pasty skinned snorkeler wrapped in a yellow flotation belt distracting from the peacefulness under the sea.
If you do go, avoid the boats that look like floating water parks — I would recommend Sail Maui’s Paragon II, which caps trips at 38 guests — so you’ll have fewer snorkelers near you in the water. Go during whale season (December through May) and you might even see some big fish during the breezy 2½ -mile boat ride.”
Originally written by Jen Murphy. Her website is jenrunsworld.com.