For the past decade or more, I’ve had a sticker on my iPad that reads ‘Practice Aloha’. I got the sticker from Frida’s, arguably the best Mexican restaurant on Maui, just north of Lahaina Town on Front Street. Sadly, Frida’s is no more. Although spared by the devastating fire last year, it was sold just prior to the death of its owner and has re-opened as Star Noodle – a great place for ramen but it’s not Frida’s.
But I digress. The ‘Practice Aloha’ sticker on my iPad has served as a daily reminder of not only the spirit of the Hawaiian Islands, but of what is important in my daily life. The word aloha is hard to translate into any other language because it comprises complex ways of being, and of interacting with and loving all of creation. Commonly used as both a form of greeting as well as parting, Aloha can be broadly defined as encompassing love, affection, peace, compassion, mercy, gratitude, and kindness. While today there are only about 2,000 islanders fluent in Hawaiian, the word Aloha is on the lips of virtually everyone you meet in the islands. It’s a beautiful thing.
My first time in Hawaii was over 30 years ago. At that time the population of Maui was about 90,000 Kamaʻāina, or persons of the land, as Hawaiian residents often refer to themselves. There was a big t-shirt warehouse out by the airport and not much else. The roads to Kihei and Lahaina were lined with sugar cane, Lanai was the ‘Pineapple Island’, and traffic was minimal. Today there are over 165,000 residents, t-shirt shops are everywhere, traffic can be brutal, there are no more sugar canes, Larry Ellison owns Lanai and grows super expensive resorts instead of pineapples, and, most sadly, historic Lahaina Town was destroyed by fire last August.
Much has changed, but much remains the same. The Road to Hana is still a breathtaking drive, sometimes made even more breathtaking by the hordes of tourists taking pictures from their Jeeps. The beaches and sunsets are still hard to beat, and the Honu (green sea turtles) still share Ho’okipa Beach (and other great locations I won’t disclose) with death defying surfers and kite boarders. It’s still a magical place. Aloha still abounds.
From our base in Princeville, we explored the north side, kayaking the Hanalei River and Hanalei Bay (putative home of Puff, the Magic Dragon), exploring the Limahuli Gardens, a National Tropical Botanical Garden of unsurpassing beauty, talking about Jerry Garcia with the guard at the Kilauea Lighthouse and Wildlife Refuge, journeying to the northernmost end of the road past Ha’ena Beach, and visiting the site of our nuptials on Anahola Beach.
Lisa and I were married on Kauai, called the Garden Isle thanks to the tropical rainforest covering much of the island. We were fortunate to spend a month on the islands recently, three weeks on our favorite island of Kauai. Kauai has grown at a much slower pace increasing from 65,000 in 2008 to about 74,000 today. The pace is still slow, Mount Waialeale still averages 37’ (feet) of rain every year, there are still more roosters than people, no building can be taller than a palm tree, and Aloha is everywhere.
The last couple weeks our base moved south to Kalapaki Beach on Nawiliwili Harbor. From here we covered the rest of the island including a helicopter overview of the island followed by a trek to the numerous overlooks of Waimea Canyon, the Grand Canyon of the Pacific. If you follow that road to its conclusion, you’ll come to the Kalalua Lookout, the furthest point the road goes in the interior ending at an overlook to the incredible Napali Coast.
Taking the road west past Koloa Town (home to Koloa rum), past the Pacific Missile Range Facility at Barking Sands, we love to visit Polihale Beach, a miles long stretch of perfect sand, gorgeous waves, and only a few locals for company. It’s only reachable by a five mile stretch of, at times, brutal dirt road, which dissuades most tourist visits but is no deterrent to a Colorado mountain driver (in a rental car). This is the westernmost terminus of the road on the south ending at the Napali Coast. If you want to trek around the west end of the island to connect to Ha’ena, you’ll have an 11 mile hike on a trail that, at times, has you resorting to crawling across barely passable heights with a sheer drop to the sparkling blue ocean below. Yeah, we didn’t do that.
There are myriad things to do on the island including the helicopter tour that provides aerial views of places otherwise unseen. You can tube down an old sugar plantation irrigation flume, zipline across tropical treetops, and ATV through areas seen in films like South Pacific and Jurassic Park. Everywhere you look there’s a waterfall or three, and Nene, the Hawaiian goose and official state bird, are only outnumbered by the unofficial state bird, the brightly colored and raucous rooster. There are also numerous beaches fit for relaxing, surfing or snorkeling. We got in a little snorkel time but some of the beaches (Tunnels, Polihale, Anini) were experiencing 8’ – 12’ swells with nasty rip currents. Fun to watch, not conducive to recreational snorkeling. Farmers markets abound selling all manner of fresh fruit and produce, and Rastaman Red sells the (self-proclaimed) best pineapples on the island from the back of his ancient truck under the footbridge over Nawiliwili Creek. It’s not bragging if it’s true.
I’ll close with one of our favorite Aloha moments. We love to kayak and the Hanalei River is a favorite. From launch you can paddle 2-3 miles upriver along a shoreline profuse with banana trees, wild orchids, vines, crowing roosters and these spectacular 20’ hedges of bright yellow hau (hibiscus). As the day wears on, the Hau fall to the river and fade to a mellow orange color, blanketing the river with a yellow/orange carpet of flowers. Paddling upriver from Hanalei Bay in late afternoon we were accompanied by Honu, the great green sea turtles. We’d be paddling along when suddenly a head would pop up right next to us, they would observe us interlopers to their kingdom with their huge alien eyes, then gently submerge again only to greet us again a few feet later.
Aloha may indeed be difficult to define, but sharing the world with these gentle creatures gets pretty close.
Aloha and Mahalo Nui Loa
