Dive Review of Kona Aggressor II in
Hawaii/Kona

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Kona Aggressor II: "Manta Magic in Kona", Nov, 2018, by Phil Johnston, Bayswater, AU ( Sr. Contributor 26 reports with 25 Helpful votes). Report 10661 has 4 Helpful votes.
No photos available at this time
Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Accommodations		Food
Service and Attitude		Environmental Sensitivity
Dive Operation		Shore Diving	N/A
Snorkeling	N/A
Overall Rating
Value for $$
Beginners
Advanced
Comments	The good - Kona Aggressor II is a well maintained boat, nothing broke down & judging from the newish quality of the internal fittings the boat has been renovated in the fairly recent past. The crew were uniformly helpful & approachable. The captain Mike is pretty congenial, with a never ending stream of jokes. The cook Cam's meals were uniformly high quality, special mention needs to be made of his morning & afternoon snacks such as macaroons, cinnamon buns etc. As far as the diving goes, I had relatively moderate expectations of Kona diving, & this proved to be my actual experience. Standout dive was the night Manta dive just offshore from the Sheraton Hotel south of Kona-Kailua. KA2 set the dive up pretty well, with a custom built portable floodlight that was set up in a sandy patch with the divers grouped around it, the floodlight attracting plankton which in turn attracted mantas into the viewing area. At first one, then a second full size manta repeatedly swooped over the floodlight, gulping plankton. We watched this for almost 45 minutes, the mantas brushing the tops of our heads as they turned & somersaulted to make their passes over the light. I know this is not a natural situation but its one of the best things I've experienced underwater. The rest of the diving was split between areas of coral reef at sites such as Manuka Bay, The Land of Oz, Rod's Reef & Turtle Pinnacle, and rockier slopes & walls. The hard corals weren't as good as those I've seen in Australia, Indonesia & the Philippines but in places were fairly healthy. Turtle Pinnacle in particular had some good tropical fish life over a large expanse of healthy corals. I preferred the coral reef areas such as Land of Oz over the wall dive / drop off dive sites such as Au Au crater, which I didn't find all that interesting. There were plenty of opportunities for swims through caves & under arches, many divers seem to like these but I became a bit bored with them. Visibility was good to excellent at almost all sites, which is to be expected given the absence of any river run-off on the Kona side of Hawaii Island. The main disappointment was absence of any large fish life, apart from 1 hammerhead (which I didn't see myself) & a couple of barracuda at Manuka Bay, there were basically no sharks, large fish or pelagics. We did see some dolphins whilst cruising between sites, but none whilst we were actually in the water. Overall, I'd describe the KAII as a very professionally run boat, but wouldn't rate Kona diving as highly as Komodo, Rajat Ampat, Walindi in PNG, or the Philippines.
Websites	Kona Aggressor II
Reporter and Travel
Dive Experience	Over 1000 dives
Where else diving	Australia, Fiji, Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea, Malaysia, Indonesia/Bali, Cocos, Cozumel, Tonga, Galapagos, Tahiti, Maldives, Mozambique, Bahamas, Red Sea, Roatan.
Closest Airport	Kona-Kailua	Getting There	Regular flights from Honolulu
Dive Conditions
Weather	sunny	Seas	calm
Water Temp	27-28°C / 81-82°F	Wetsuit Thickness
Water Visibility	12-25 M / 39-82 Ft
Dive Policy
Dive own profile	yes
Enforced diving restrictions	The usual things - no deco diving, no solo diving
Liveaboard?	yes	Nitrox Available?	yes
What I Saw
Sharks	1 or 2	Mantas	1 or 2
Dolphins	None	Whale Sharks	None
Turtles	None	Whales	None
Ratings 1(worst) - 5 (best):
Corals		Tropical Fish
Small Critters		Large Fish
Large Pelagics
Underwater Photography 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Subject Matter		Boat Facilities
Overall rating for UWP's		Shore Facilities	N/A
UW Photo Comments	I'm not an underwater photographer but the KA2 seemed pretty well set up for UAPs

Report currently has 4 Helpful votes

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Dive Review of Kona Aggressor II in Hawaii/Kona

Kona Aggressor II: "Manta Magic in Kona", Nov, 2018,

Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):

Overall Rating

Reporter and Travel

Dive Conditions

Dive Policy

What I Saw

Ratings 1(worst) - 5 (best):

Underwater Photography 1 (worst) - 5 (best):

Dive Review of Kona Aggressor II in
Hawaii/Kona