The last three days of our recent vacation were spent on the Hawaiian island of Maui.
< Maui
Maui seems like the one-stop destination of the state, offering both the high-end shopping and resort life of Oahu and the outdoor activities of The Big Island. Because we'd already been to both Oahu and The Big Island we were a little underwhelmed. This may also be due to the fact we were very tired by this point.
While out hotel (yellow star on map) was lovely, the developers of the resort area of Kaanapaali had seen fit to place every large hotel in the exact same spot, which gave the area a distinctly artificial and overdeveloped feel (in direct contrast to the organic tourism of Hawaii). Even so, it was immediately obvious that Maui was the location-of-choice for (American) honeymooners and those that take regular vacations to Hawaii. Because of this, and if you only have a few days to spend, Maui may be the best place to see most of what Hawaii has to offer. If you have a longer itinerary though, I'd suggest Oahu and The Big Island and skipping Maui.
We only had two full days on Maui, and the one thing we really needed to do was drive the famous 'Road to Hana'. This is a highway that hugs the northeastern coast of the island for about 30 miles. Short though it may be, it is one of the most winding highways in the world and takes over 2 hours to drive. The turns are blind; the road narrow but the scenery breathtaking...
< Hana Highway
The road (allegedly) has 617 turns and 58 one lane bridges. Many sections of the road are one-lane as well, and a good portion of the turns are blind (some are blind, one-lane turns). As a popular tourist drive the road is well travelled and very well maintained, so it’s not dangerous (more exciting). Besides, everyone drives slowly to take in the views, including waterfalls, lovely ocean vistas, wildlife (we passed two large wild pigs just hanging out on the roadside) and a lengthy stretch where a ceiling of massive bamboo covers the road.
The town of Hana, at the end of the road, is not much. And since there is no road wrapping around the SE corner of Maui, one must take the Hana highway back to civilization again (so is you choose to drive it, you commit to doing it both ways). We did however, stop at a state park near Hana which features a beautiful black-sand beach:
< Disrespectin' Nature
The rest of our short Maui trip was simply relaxing, souvenir shopping, eating some of the best fish I've ever tasted ('Ono') and watching edge-of-our-seat Japanese drama's on the hotel TV (Hawaii has a Japanese TV channel, Kiku TV).
< Last Evening Sunset
Oh yes, in our Maui hotel we were only a couple of rooms down the hall from where The Devil stays, during his Hawaii sojourns...
< Satan's Room