Swimming With Dolphins in Hawaii

For my 30th birthday, my fiance and I spent a week in Oahu, Hawaii. While we were there, we went swimming with dolphins with the tour guide, Dolphins & You. It was AMAZING. Here is an overview of our day out at sea with Dolphins & You.

There were two tours to choose from each day, the morning and afternoon. We choose the 7am tour, hoping the water would be calm with no wind to make the snorkeling more enjoyable. We arrived at the dock about 10 minutes early, checked in, and hopped on the boat. There were about 20-25 people on our tour, and it didn’t feel crowded at all. The boat itself is pretty big, lots of space to move around. As we headed out, the crew gave us an overview of what to expect for the day, a quick run down of the snorkel gear, and then sang and danced to a traditional Hawaiian song to get everyone excited!

We cruised along the coastline for about 30 minutes or so before we saw our first dolphins. The crew called out DOLPHINS, LET’S GO! Already dressed and ready with our snorkel gear on, one by one we each jumped off the back into the boat and into the water. We had a few of the crew members swimming along side us to make sure we all felt safe. The water was crystal clear. As I had my head down scanning for dolphins, all of a sudden in the near distance a pod of dolphins appeared! They were cruising together along the bottom, and the tour guide said they were most likely still sleeping since they were all huddle together and not surfacing.

Seeing dolphins in the wild, in their natural habitat is probably one the coolest things in the world. When I was little, I was obsessed with dolphins. To this day, I still have a fascination with them. Swimming in the warm waters of Hawaii, alongside these beautiful creatures is like heaven on earth for me.

We swam for about 10-15 minutes watching the dolphins. As the got further and further away, the crew instructed us to go back to the boat. We hopped in and motored about another 10 minutes or so before we saw another pod. Once again we all dove off and swam to see the dolphins. The sunlight was shimmering through the water and you could see the white sandy bottom …it was such a magical moment. It was one of those experiences I wanted to take a million photos, but at the same time I just wanted to float there, live in the moment and just watch them. I didn’t want this moment to end, and as we swam back towards the boat I looked around one last time, taking a mental note about this memory so that I would never forget it.

For the remainder of the trip, we anchored closer to shore, and for about 45 minutes we were able to swim at our own leisure, eat our lunch and just chill. We saw a ton of fish, spotted a sting ray, and went down the huge slide off the side of the boat. As tour came to a close, we waived goodbye to the dolphins and headed to the dock. Only about at 15 minute ride back, we listened to Hawaiian music and enjoyed the stunning view of the island. After we got off the boat, we thanked the crew and took a few final photos.

If you are looking to swim with dolphins, Dolphins & You is by far THE BEST! The staff is so friendly, we saw a ton of dolphins, the boat was big and clean, the lunch was great, overall just an amazing experience! I would 1000% recommend them to anyone looking to swim with dolphins. Best birthday ever!

To learn more about Dolphins & You, check out their website! Click here to view it.

Bye friends!