My wife Jessica and I fell in love with Kauai on our first visit back in 1999, and visit (now with our son) every chance we get. It's primarily the natural beauty that draws us - we love hiking and kayaking and snorkeling, as well as just sitting and watching the ocean and its inhabitants. But everything isn't always perfect in paradise. Jessica especially loves snorkeling and has been distressed as we've watched the decline of the reefs over the years.
On our last trip to Kauai, we were talking to a local about the sad state of the reef. She said someone was working on fixing it, and we thought that sounded exciting, but it was the last day of our trip and we didn't have a chance to follow up until we returned home. Fortunately, we were able to meet, via email and phone, a wonderful scientist named Katherine Muzik. It turns out she is one of the world's top experts on coral, and her current project, "Mala Moana" ("Ocean Garden"), entails transplanting a special variety of coral that appears to be resistant to the environmental effects that have killed much of the rest of the coral around Kauai.
While we've been active in other charitable areas over the year (particularly around horse welfare and rescue), we've never been more than concerned (and hopefully conscientious) tourists with respect to Kauai.
But meeting Katherine inspired us to try to help, so we put
together a calendar with pictures of Kauai that Jessica has taken
over the years that we've been visiting. The main pictures are
all of Honu (Hawaiian Green Sea Turtles), with smaller pictures
representative of the many amazing sites on Kauai. We are selling
the calendars for $20 each, with
For more information about Mala Moana, please visit the
Mala Moana project page.
--- Kevin Fink, 17 Feb 2016
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