Entries tagged 'beaches'
Hawaii Beaches: Proposed Smoking Ban for Waikiki Beach
There's nothing that turns me off more than walking through the warm sand in Waikiki and wandering through a cloud of cigarette smoke as some tourist lights a butt and then ruins it for everyone nearby. Call me a smoke...
Hawaii Beaches: Flemings on Maui, Amerca's Best in 2006, Still the Greatest
Flemings on Maui is one of those beaches locals love but tourists rarely hit -- not a lot of hotels nearby. This video does it justice as its a beach that has everything. Left section is great for kids...
Mele Kelikimaka! Hope to See Y'all Soon in Paradise! That's Hawaii, BTW
Here's a slideshow / video compilation of some of the best nature in Hawaii accompanied by -- what else? - that incomparable Hawaii Christmas song, Mele Kelikimaka. Here we know that Christmas will be clean and bright. Sun will...
Hawaii Weather Report Part II: Obama? Who's That? Nice Beach, Eh?
This Hawaii beach is on the most populous island, Oahu, a stones toss from urban Honolulu. Located on the Windward Side of Oahu near Kailua (where Barack Obama is supposedly vacationing right now) is considered crowded by some locals...
Hawaii Beach Erosion: Kailua Beach - Going, Going, Gone?
A picture tells 1,000 words and this one from the Honolulu Advertiser tells it all. Kailua Beach, on the Windward Side of Oahu, is in dire straits. Huge chunks have eroded, leaving roots of shading ironwood trees exposed. Erosion...
More Obama Madness in Hawaii: Goes to Magic Island for Beach with Fam
Local media is reporting that Barack Obama took his family to Magic Island today for a dip and some sun. This is a pretty nice urban beach, also called Ala Moana Beach Park. Formerly overrun by homeless (the park, not...
Obama on the Beach in Hawaii - Kailua
The video does not do Kailua Beach justice. Dawn lighting in overcast not so great. This is a world class beach. Interesting vid, tho -- how many people are staying in that house?...
Controversial Beach Restoration in Waikiki: Will Three's, Populars Get Sandbagged?
The owners of several large Sheraton-flagged resorts in Waikiki has decided to push ahead with a highly controversial plan to recreate a beach in front of the massive Sheraton Waikiki hotel. Formerly called Grey's Beach, this stretch of sand has...
Best Hawaii Beaches: Napili on Maui -- Unsung, Unstressed
I love Napili Beach. It's not a secret but its not totally blown, either. There are no major hotels on this gem of a bay, just south of Kapalua Resort. It's ringed by condos but none are taller than...
Best Beaches for Kids in Hawaii: Anini Beach, Kauai
Here's one of my favorite beaches in the islands for kids. Shallow waters in the near shore area, clear and cool, sandy bottoms are nice on the footsies. The far side of the beach is pretty much isolated with...
Test Drive Our New Hawaii Search Engine -- The Best Way to Search for Hawaii Info, Or Not?
Check it out here at search.hawaiirama.com. Tell us what you think and what can be made better -- or if it totally rocks, tell us that, too. Hint -- this thing is best for detailed searches into Hawaii topics. We...
Microsoft Mobile Post from Kauai: Anini Beach Reverie
This is a mobile post sponsored by Microsoft. When you see the icon, you know I'm posting amok. Anyway, today am coming at you from Anini Beach on the magical island of Kauai. Anini is one of a number...
Microsoft Mobile on Maui: Wailea Wonderland
This post is brought to you by Microsoft, which generously sponsored my trip to Maui (indirectly, of course). When you see the Mobile Post icon, you know I'm posting somewhere in Hawaii. Look closely. Here's a picture of Wailea...
Microsoft Mobile Post from Sandy Beach Sunday: Hawaii's Best Beaches
I'm blogging live from Sandy Beach, Oahu, a stunning little crescent usually pummeled by massive shore break (enough to make it dangerous) on the Southeast corner of this island. This post is sponsored Microsoft as part of its Mobile...
Live Audio from Kaimana Beach -- Not That It's Any Different Than Any Other Day Here
Another hearty mahalo to Mister Softee (Microsoft) for sponsoring Hawaiirama for a bit and funding my outrageous restaurant habit. Thanks, Bill! I got your back in Hawaii! Check out a brief audio post covering one of my favorite beaches...
Kauai's Untouched Paradise: Kipu Kai Adventure Log
Andy Kass over at the Kauai hiking blog does a great write-up of an excursion in to Kipu Kai, a totally untouched cluster of beaches hemmed in by mountains on a private ranch along Kauai's sunny South Coast. This...
Hawaii Governor Sez Buy Turtle Bay, Stop Da Condos
Hawaii's Governor Lindal Lingle floated a proposal today for the state to purchase Turtle Bay on Oahu's windy, wave-swept North Shore. She claimed that Hawaii has a "once in a lifetime chance" (according to PBN) to preserve the rural lifestyle...
Hapuna Beach, Big Island: Most Dangerous Beach in Hawaii
Hapuna Beach is definitely one of the nicest beaches in the Hawaiian Islands, a long stretch of wide yellow sand rimming a crystal blue bay. Alas, it's also one of the most dangerous. This research surprised me, because Hapuna, while...
Sometimes Life is Not a Beach: Intimidation at Honolua Goes to Trial
This Maui News article put me back on my heels. Apparently a family of local toughs was shaking down visitors and even local residents for "donations" in order to access a public beach path. Carrying bodyboards and a video camera...
Hawaii Best Lists: Best Beaches with No Hotels On Them
No doubt, Hawaii has its fair share of hotels, condos and other at times overwrought signs of civlization. But there are plenty of lovely beaches that are relatively untouched and some that are outside residential areas that remain totally...
Shark Attack of Bellows Beach: Lovely Beach, Bloody Scene
The Honolulu Advertiser is reporting a serious shark attack off Bellows Beach, an extremely popular and lovely beach in Windward Oahu. I've mentioned Bellows before as a hidden gem and a great shady beach for late afternoons. Shark attacks off...
Hawaii Beache Guides: Big island Gem, Black Sand Beach in Punalu'u
">The southern shore of the Big Island is not known for its beaches. The landscape is rugged with the remnants of recent volcanic eruptions. The shoreline tends to be rocky in most places. Then there’s Punalu'u Beach Park, an idyllic...
Hawaii Travel: T&L Visits Oahu, Again
T&L taps Malia Boyd (I know both her and her husband, Stewart Yerton) for its semi-annual Oahu roundup. Malia talks to local promoter Tim Bostock and his wife for a local perspective. They provide some nice tips of places a...
Hawaii Hiking: Kauai's Kalalau Trail -- Signature Hike Dangerouly Deteriorated on Na Pali Coast
The Garden Isle on Kauai has an article about the famed Kalalau Trail, a trek along the base of the sea cliffs on the uninhabited northern side of the island. No roads there but plenty of waterfalls. Access comes...
Hawaii Trips: Kauai Trek Part 2 - Scout Troop Heads Out to Sea
HEADING OUT TO SEA The next day, the troop gladly traded its hiking boots for swimsuits and snorkeling masks. Hopping aboard high-speed boats, the Scouts set out to see Na Pali at sea level. Along the way to the snorkeling...
Big Island Family Vacation: Surf, Kayak, Cruise, Relax
(Here's the first in a series of family itineraries that I'm going to run, starting with Big Island. Enjoy and let me know if anything's wrong.) So you've finally arrived. The Big Island is impressive from any viewpoint and your...
Kauai Guide: Hanalei, Poipu, Hotels, Beaches. Fun Galore
King Kamehameha I, who unified the Hawaiian Islands with an iron fist, failed not once but twice in his attempts to capture Kauai. That rebellious spirit lives on: By Hawaii standards, Kauai is still more than a bit untamed...
Hawaii Beach Guide: Lydgate Park, Kauai
This wonderful little beach park is often overlooked by tourists but that's their loss.Lydgate is a county park so there are bathroom facilities, showers, parking and lifeguards (one of the few beaches on Kauai that does). There are two wading...
Hawaii Beaches: Brouhaha at Hamoa Bay?
Maui Time Weekly (which is a really fun publication) reports that the Hotel Hana Maui, a venerable queen of the Hawaii hotel scene and the only high-end resort in the isolated, lush Hana district, is refusing to let people...
Hawaii Beach Guides: Kehena
What with all the fuss about Puna becoming the up and coming low-key vacation locale in the islands, it's time to revisit the black sends of Kehena. This one of the only swimming beaches on the Puna Coast of the...
Best Hawaii Beaches, According to Locals: Lanikai, Makena Webwire Says
The editorial staff at Internet press release factory Webwire polled a bunch of locals as to their favorite beaches. The results were hardly illuminating, with no beach listed that isn't among the most well known in the state. The only...
Hawaii Beaches: Hideaways Beach, Kauai Secret
This little-known and lightly visited beach sits just below Princeville Hotel and has the Hawaiian name Pali Ke Kua. The trail access to the beach is located just before the Princeville Hotel gatehouse running alongside the tennis courts of...
Waikiki Jellyfish Attack: 15 year-old Goes to Hospital With Gnarly Sting
A quick reminder from mother nature that even small, squishy packages pack a punch in King Neptune's Garden. The monthly box jellyfish onslaught that washes ashore in Waikiki and along southern shores of Oahu sent an unsuspecting visitor to the...
Traffic Disaster: Waimea Bay Road Closure A Bit More Than Temporary
Anyone who has driven around Waimea Bay couldn't have helped but notice the massive chain-link fence with thick metal rings setting the eastern cliff off from the road. But manmade measures apparently cannot hold back the gods. A rockslide...
Hawaii Beach Guides: Hamoa Bay
Ringed black-lava sea cliffs, Hamoa Bay near the remote town of Hana was a favorite of literary icons and Hawaii lovers Mark Twain and James Michener. It's easy to see why. The soft, dark sands of this gray crescent composed...
Lanikai Beach War Brewing? Kailua Nabe Board Affairs
I track goings on in Kailua because its one of my favorite places to visit and the beaches are superb. We usually go to Kailua Beach Park because parking is easy. Lanikai is as pretty and a nice change of...
Hawaii Beach Guides: Lumahai Beach on Kauai
Locals and lifeguards call it "Luma-die Beach" after the high rate of drowning and the treacherous near shore waters pounded by surf and vicious currents. In other words, swim at Lumahai at your own risk and only in the summer....
Hawaii Beach Guides: Kalama Beach Park - Kailua Lite
This little park is a hidden gem tucked away from the rest of Kailua on the northern reaches of the vast Kailua Beach. How is it different than Kailua Beach Park and Lanikai? It's a little less crowded, for starters....
Hawaii Beach Guide : Lanikai - Faded Favorite but Still Fab
Dr. Beach, Stephen Leatherman, has picked this stretch of lovely pinkish sand as America's Best. Lanikai is a gem but one with a growing list of caveats. First, among all the great Hawaii beaches, Lanikai may have suffered the...
Hawaii Beach Guides: Chun's Reef
On a recent day out surfing at Chun's on Oahu's North Shore, I looked back at the beach and thought -- holy cow! That's actually a great little beach. You can't really see much of the beach from the road...
Barack Obama Hawaii Vacation Tour
Continuing our shameless Web traffic grab with the Hawaiirama Obamarama Vacation Tour....So Barry (as he was called during his Punahou days) apparently was a keen bodysurfer. As a town guy, that means he probably spent a few days getting...
Hawaii Barack Obama Travel Guide
This is the first installment in a semi-random series of notes on where Barack Obama (or Barry as he was known out here) hangs/hung out in the island. We'll start with the most obvious -- a recent picture of Obama...
Luxury Island at One-Third the Price: Hotel Lanai
Lanai is the private island, the one that food magnate David Murdoch owns virtually in its entirety. It's also where Microsoft founder Bill Gates went for his wedding. Lanai is home to two lavish Four Seasons resorts, the Lodge at...
Maui Hotels: Kapalua Villas -- Memo to Diane at Ridge Realty
Dear Diane at Ridge Realty: I am not sure if you are aware of this yet but you are definitely costing your company, Ridge Realty, significant chunks of cashola. Let me introduce you to TripAdvisor.com. I have a love/hate relationship...
Ko'Olina Lagoons: Keiki Friendly Fun
The Ko'olina Resort area is, like Waikiki, a man-made wonder. So be it. The resort's four swimming lagoons, which are open to the public like all Hawaii beaches, are marvelous. Calm and clear with a fringing reef, sandy bottoms and...
Hawaii Hotels: The Fun and the Beachless
During the winter months, sunseekers flock to Hawaii for the beach. A good swimming beach, however, is hardly a pre-requisite for a hotel location. On the Big Island, in particular, where swimming beaches are few and far between, many resorts...
Turtle Bay Controversy: Guv Says No!
In an interesting twist, Hawaii Governor Linda Lingle in her second innaugural address came out squarely against major development at Turtle Bay and surrounding beaches. This fit in with her argument that should Hawaii continue to rely on land development...
Hawaii Beaches: Mahaulepu Beach, Pick of Kauai's South Shore
The drive to Maha'ulepu Beach takes you through the dusty remnants of a now dormant suger cane plantation along Kauai's sunny southern shore. Go to the eastern end of Poipu Road where the pavement turns into a rutted dirt road....
Hawaii Beaches: Untouched Oahu Gem -- Kawela Bay
I almost hate telling people about this spot. It's so perfect, and its right on Oahu. Kawela Bay is one of the last semi-secret beaches on this most populous of Hawaiian Islands. "Magnum P.I." and "Lost" have both filed scenes...
Department of Relentless Commercialism: Waikiki Land Grab
It's really a tiny pocket beach between the Sheraton Waikiki and the Halekulani. I guess they call it Grey's Beach and its a nice spot. There's a beautiful shady hau tree that's nice to sit under when the homeless haven't...
Hawaii YouTube Video of the Day: Skimboarding at Makena
What the heck is skimboarding? Basically, its akin to surfing but rather than paddle into a wave, the boarder runs towards shorebreak, slides the board out in front of himself / herself, jumps on the board as it begins...
Hawaii Hotel Reviews: Hilton Hawaiian Village
Pros: The Hilton sits on a stretch of rather nice beach, one of the widest in Waikiki. While its rarely empty, this beach tends to feel less crowded than the other primary Waikiki beaches. There is a great swimming channel...
Hawaii YouTube Video of the Day:
I'm generally opposed to semi-cheesy "slideshows" of a bunch of stills slapped together with some music patched over it. But this montage (some video, mostly still) really covers Poipu, Kauai very well, and, frankly, makes me want to go...
Earthquake Update: Big Island -- Polulu Trail Reopens
The October quake struck pretty much directly off the coast of North Kohala on the Big Island. Access to Polulu Valley, a sheer amphitheater valley literally at the end of the road in North Kohala, was shut down after big...
YouTube Hawaii Video of the Day: Bellows Beach
I've written about Bellows Beach in past posts. It's one of our favorite in all the islands and is seriously underappreciated by the travel press. Which is actually fine -- more beach for those willing to make the drive....
NYT Travel Mag Does Oahu
Props to my good friend Lesa Griffith, who is also a lifestyle editor at the Honolulu Advertiser, for this solid piece in NYT Travel Mag covering Oahu. A good read for anyone coming to Oahu soon. One caveat --...
Hawaii Beach Video of the Day: Waikiki 360
A 360-degree shot of the beach in front of the Hilton Hawaiian Village in Waikiki. This is one of the widest beach stretches along Waikiki and its got great surfing offshore (Kaiser's), a wonderful swimming channel, and an easy...
Hawaii Beach Guides: Oahu's Best Beginner Surf Spots -- Canoes
Here's the latests in our series of beach lists from John Clark, the noted Hawaii beach expert and all around beach nut, will be feeding us his extremely informed take on beaches around Hawaii. You can buy his books...
Big Island Gem: Mahai‘ula Beach
One simple pleasure of exploring Hawai‘i Island’s sunny, lava-drenched west side is discovering a precious nugget like Mahai‘ula Beach, also known as Kekaha Kai State Park. Make it past the bumpy – but negotiable – semi-paved lava road and you’ll...
Hawaii Beach Guides: Oahu Beginner Surf Spots - White Plains
Here's the latests in our series of beach lists from John Clark, the noted Hawaii beach expert and all around beach nut, will be feeding us his extremely informed take on best beaches around the Aloha State. At any...
Hawaii Hotels: Royal Hawaiian Hotel
Pros: A true classic hotel and one of the most architecturally interesting buildings in Hawaii. The Royal -- also called "the Pink Palace" -- retains the charming aura of a bygone era. It sounds cliched but the long, echoing...
Hawaii Hotel Deals: Turtle Bay on Sale, $199
Credit to Hapa Hale for spotting a killer deal at Turtle Bay, $199 per night. Not sure what this exactly buys you in terms of views, but most of the rooms at the resort have an ocean view of...
Hawaii Beach Guides: Three Best Walking Beaches on the Big Island
Here's the latests in our series of beach lists from John Clark, the noted Hawaii beach expert and all around beach nut, will be feeding us his extremely informed take on best beaches around the Aloha State. At any...
North Shore of Oahu on the Weekends - Crowded in Da' Country!
I went to the North Shore on Saturday, ostensibly to spend a quiet night in the country with the family unit. It was anything but. The trip started out well enough, with a leisurely lunch at Haleiwa Joes, where the...
Small Hotels: Hale Makai in Haena, Kauai
The Hanalei area of Kauai has four world-class beaches in Ke'e, Tunnels, Haena, and Hanalei Bay. Surfers, snorkelers, beach combers and every other type of beach lover can find their ultimate calling in Hanalei. The area also has the...
Top 3 Walking Beaches: Kauai
Here's the latests in our series of beach lists from John Clark, the noted Hawaii beach expert and all around beach nut, will be feeding us his extremely informed take on best beaches around the Aloha State. We're breaking...
Top 3 Walking Beaches: Oahu
Here's the second in this series.. John Clark, the noted Hawaii beach expert and all around beach nut, will be feeding us his extremely informed take on best beaches around the Aloha State. We're breaking them down into all different...
Top 3 Walking Beaches on Maui: Kaanapali, Makena, Wailea
I'm introducing a new feature that will be a regular fixture on Hawaiirama. John Clark, the noted Hawaii beach expert and all around beach nut, will be feeding us his extremely informed take on best beaches around the Aloha...
Beaches We Love: Kauna`oa
This Big Island beauty fronts one of Hawaii's classic resorts, the angular, elegant and Frank Lloyd Wright-esque Mauna Kea Beach Hotel. The sand is quite fine and the surf generally mellow. Due to its strong westerly orientation sunsets are...
Places We Love: Makena
Why we love it: No hotels in sight, long enough for a really long stroll or to find some solitude, gorgeous views of Kaho'olawe and Lanai across the channel, generally good for swimming. The only downsides are the surf...
Best Beaches: Kuki'o
This is one of my favorite beaches in the islands. It's not a big beach but its truly stunning. Actually, Kuki'o is more like a peninsula with two pocket beaches and fabulous lawn overlooking crystal clear water. There is...
Maui: On the Lam in Paia: Part 2
We flew into Kahului in the early morning (my son gets me up at 5:30 am so its always a little difficult but I'm kinda used to it by now). Our first stop, after renting the car, was Wailea,...
