Manta Haven, USA

By Darryl Leniuk (Adapted from "passport to diving the world")

Well Known For :

One of the best divespot to witness the Mantas at night.

Manta rays swoop overhead like stealth bombers, scooping up clouds of plankton with their huge Hoover-like mouths. They come directly at me - so close I can lean back and kiss their bellies - only to veer away at the last possible moment. Some are more than five metres across. It's night and I'm 10m down, kneeling on the bottom in a sandy bay a stone's throw from Kona International Airport. In the centre of the action is The Bonfire, a circle of rocks with two boxes of lights pointed skyward. The lights attract plankton; the plankton attracts mantas. Most nights more than a dozen mantas come for their evening meal in a nightly ritual that has been attracting divers for more than a decade.

(Ok enough with the stories, I'm itchin' for a dive)