Hawaiian Fauna

We arrived in Maui fairly late at night.  It was dark and we didn't see much.  The next day we were informed that there was a monk seal resting on the beach right near where we were staying.  The monk seals are endangered, so at times they had him roped off.  They didn't want people to get too close.  He was pretty mellow and didn't seem to mind people.

One day we went whale watching.  Right now is the tale-end of the whale season there.  Soon the humpback whales will swim back to Alaska.  On the whale watching trip we got to see a group of whales in "competition" which means they were pretty active in coming above the water.  On the boat, we were somewhat close to the whales, but they try to maintain a distance of at least 100 yards away. (The first picture is zoomed in.) We could also see the whales from shore and we saw them several different days.  One time I even saw one while we were driving along the coast.

We also saw and heard birds.  A bird like this one, joined us at the table for lunch one day.

And we saw quite a few wild chickens.