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I知 heading to the big slabs with the wife come late January - I致e spent a day and change on the island and will be sure to eat a bunch of poke and will be spending some time at volcano national park, but I知 keeping an eye out for other not to be missed stuff. We enjoy hikes and nature and we値l definitely be spending some time kayaking as well. Breweries, animals and whatever else is welcome!
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Dec 3, 2018 01:44
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| # ? Apr 26, 2024 22:21 |
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Definitely do a tour to walk out to the lava. I was there five years ago, so I'm sure the path of the lava has changed (actually since it took out another subdivision last year it's probably easier to get to now) but it's totally worth doing. Seeing real live lava flows and standing on earth that is literally ten minutes old is not to be missed. Find a really, really long stick in the forest beforehand and bring a bag of marshmallows if you want the coolest roasted marshmallows you'll ever have in your life. But don't hold them too close to the lava, the exploding silicone turns into glass shards and that's not a great thing to eat. Spend a day at Kealakekua Bay. It's a long downhill to get there, and a great spot to snorkel, have a picnic, and just hang out for a while. There will be boats and kayaks that will come over to do their snorkelling tours, but we saw like one other person in six hours on land, so we basically had it all to ourselves. Plus, it's the spot where Captain Cook was eventually killed by the Hawaiians after being a gigantic dick, so it's got some history as well. Apparently there's a plaque, but my husband (who's Australian, so Cook has a fair bit of meaning to him) wasn't able to find it. Go up Mauna Kea at night for an absolutely incredible view of the night sky. Totally worth it. We did it with a tour, and depending on your personal circumstances, that could be a decent idea as you really do lose oxygen up there, and I recommend acclimatizing halfway as well. I'm a freak of nature whose parents both run marathons so when the guy passed around the oxygenation monitor at the top of the mountain I was still at 96% oxygen, but almost everyone was in the mid-high 80s, and my husband said that if he did anything more than a decent-paced walk he was feeling extremely dizzy. Also, when you're in Volcanoes National Park, drive down to look at the Petroglyphs. They're pretty cool, and it doesn't take long. Neither me nor my husband like beer, so can't help you with the breweries, sorry! edit: Also there was this one really nice beach I liked, up north from Kona, that had some pretty great coral right off the beach. Hapuna Beach, I think it was.
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Dec 3, 2018 22:06
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I just got back yesterday from 10 days on the big island, so I'll tell you what I liked the best while it's still fresh. First, unfortunately there's no longer an active lava flow on the island (for the first time in something like 40 years), but the Volcano National Park is still well worth visiting. Check out the steam vents and then drive the Chain of Craters road down to the sea arch - there are multiple stops along the way of different things to see (including the petroglyphs). A lot of the bigger tourist attractions within the park are permanently closed due to the recent eruption, so don't plan too much around information more than a couple months old. Best to stop in at the ranger station at the entrance and ask them what else is worth doing beyond the Chain of Craters drive. If you have the national park pass, you should also stop by Pu置honua O Honaunau. It's a culturally significant site to the native Hawaiians that is pretty cool to walk around, and it happens to be right next to the best snorkeling on the island at Two Step, which has a massive and healthy coral reef. Other good areas specifically for snorkeling: Mahukona Beach Park (sunken farm equipment and colorful fish), Kahalu置 Beach Park (nice tide pools), and Punalu置 Black Sand Beach (lots of turtles). My favorite beaches to just hang out at or swim: Mauna Kea beach, Hapuna beach, Makalawena Beach (this one was my favorite of all - requires a 15 min walk past Mahai'ula beach on a lava field, but is well worth it. If you arrive by 9 you'll have the whole beach to yourself for a couple hours). Two best beaches for watching the sunset (but not good for much else) are Wawaloli beach park and Kailua Beach (old airport beach). Didn't do much hiking, but did end up exploring the Kaumana Caves lava tube for ~45 minutes. Seems like it goes on for miles. Well worth it but bring a headlamp! All the best waterfalls are on the Hilo side of the island and most of them you basically just drive up to. Rainbow falls and Akaka falls are both really pretty and worth checking out if you're over there. Mauna Kea has several observatories and massive telescopes that you can book tours to see, but it will take either a 4 wheel drive jeep or an organized tour to get up there. You can drive part of the way up the mountain in any car though, and they do free stargazing parties at the mid-point ranger station on certain nights. For breweries there is Kona Brewing and Ola Brew Company. Kona is huge and corporate and very busy, Ola is much more intimate and doesn't bottle most of their beer so I'd give them my vote. Ola also does interesting things with cider so make sure to give those a try. If you guys are into wine, also check out Volcano Winery - it's the only vineyard on the island. They do interesting things with blending their grape wines with fermented guava juice and other tropical fruit juices, and they make a killer mead from local honey. Not the best wine ever but it's worth checking out just for how unusual it is. Agri-tourism is a major thing to do on the island, so there are dozens of coffee plantations, mac nut orchards, goat farms, etc etc to visit. I did tours at Greenwell farms (coffee; free), Big Island Bees (honey, $10), and The Vanillerie (Vanilla beans, $15). All 3 of them were super interesting and the people giving the tours were very passionate about what they do. I thought it was well worth the time and money, and I ended up coming home with a couple products from each place. There are also cacao plantations south of Hilo that give tours and demos of cacao harvesting and chocolate making, but I didn't have time to do it - some of them are listed on AirBnB experiences if you want to investigate. One other unique thing I did was to take a tour at an Octopus research center called Kanaloa Octopus Farm for $30. You get to learn about the difficulty of raising octopus sustainably, and pet/feed them. Pretty cool experience and worth the money if you're into that kind of thing! I know there's also a parrot sanctuary, a seahorse farm, and manta ray snorkeling/diving trips if you want to look into other animal encounters, but I didn't have time for these so can't vouch for them. For Poke, my favorite spots were Umekes and Da Poke Shack on the Kona side, and Suisan Fish Market in Hilo. Also, the best produce I had on the island was at the South Kona Fruit Stand. Just an amazing selection of tropical fruits, and they make great smoothies so check it out on your way to Volcanos NP. Hope this is helpful, let me know if you have any other specific questions!
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Dec 7, 2018 08:39
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My spouse and I are thinking about going to Hawaii sometime next summer for about a week. Should we pick one island and stick with it? Any recommended guides or resources for planning? We're not really set on seeing anything outside of doing some snorkeling, checking out volcanoes and possibly an observatory.
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Dec 12, 2018 01:04
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Well if you want to see active volcanoes and an observatory you're going to want to do The Big Island. If you're just there for a week stick to the one island for sure. No use in island hopping on that little time, especially since Hawaii has everything you want.
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Dec 12, 2018 03:11
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We're going to the Big Island for 3 and a half days next month. We're staying in Kona. Our plan is to spend one day at Volcanoes National Park, a day going on agricultural tours, and a day on beaches swimming and snorkeling. Is that reasonable? I've heard you can find boats that take you to snorkeling reefs at Kealakekua Bay. Is that still possible with Covid restrictions?
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Dec 1, 2021 16:13
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Sleepytime posted:My spouse and I are thinking about going to Hawaii sometime next summer for about a week. Not to dissuade you because many people do go island-hopping but just an FYI if you didn't already know, there are no ferries between them. If you want to do multiple islands you'll have to fly to each one.
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Dec 1, 2021 17:38
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^Thank you. We found plenty to do on the big island between Volcanoes and checking out stuff on the other side. The X-man cometh posted:We're going to the Big Island for 3 and a half days next month. We're staying in Kona. Our plan is to spend one day at Volcanoes National Park, a day going on agricultural tours, and a day on beaches swimming and snorkeling. Is that reasonable? That sounds like a good plan? I don't know if you have time / if it's too late to schedule but we took a group tour to the summit of Mauna Kea. Really awesome views. But I'm not sure what the current situation would be for that or the snorkeling boats that you asked about.
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Dec 1, 2021 22:55
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The X-man cometh posted:We're going to the Big Island for 3 and a half days next month. We're staying in Kona. Our plan is to spend one day at Volcanoes National Park, a day going on agricultural tours, and a day on beaches swimming and snorkeling. Is that reasonable? Definitely get an early start for Volcanos. We went there from Kona also, left a little late, and ran out of time to fully experience everything as planned.
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Dec 3, 2021 18:19
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Highly recommend the manta ray experiences near Kona. Very very cool. (Bring a waterproof bag for your phone)
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Aug 11, 2022 21:13
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film_critic posted:Highly recommend the manta ray experiences near Kona. Very very cool. (Bring a waterproof bag for your phone) That was my wife痴 favorite thing we did on the big island, even more than Mauna Kea summit, helicopter ride around the entire island etc.
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Sep 23, 2022 02:42
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Headed to the big island in April with the wife and a 6 and 8 year old in tow. We're staying in Puako. Any other recommendations for young ones? My kids aren't super outdoorsy and gripe after more than 30 minutes hiking, so accessibility weighs on my decision making a bit. I really enjoyed the bamboo forest at Haleakala on Maui years back, anything similar within say an hour of where we're staying? SuicidalSmurf fucked around with this message at 07:52 on Feb 10, 2023 |
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Feb 8, 2023 08:32
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I haven't been up the mountain at night, and the peak is a quite a bit higher than the visitor centre, but I can't help but think it should be gorgeous. I haven't done it but I heard that the ray diving you can do outside of Kona is supposed to be amazing. Might want to check on the age limits, from what I understand you can just hang out next to the boat with a scuba mask and snorkel. Others can probably explain better. It's on the far side of the island but not terrible far from Hilo, but Volcanoes park is neat and you can very likely see lava bubbling away in the distance which may be a once in a lifetime experience. When you go to Mauna Kea, you're part way to Hilo.
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Feb 13, 2023 15:43
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Go to volcanoes park when it's dark and you can see the glow of the lava. Like a big red light in the crater. It was harder to spot once the sun came up.
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Feb 13, 2023 16:13
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| # ? Apr 26, 2024 22:21 |
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I just got back and did a fair amount of hiking in case anyone wants more input there. The best way to experience Volcanoes National Park is over 2 or more full days. My strategy has been to stay in the town of Volcano, which is like 10 minutes from the park by car. I like the Holo Holo Inn, a friendly hostel with a communal kitchen, washer/dryer, and private rooms available. This way we can get to the park by sunrise when there are very few people there, hike for a few hours, then get breakfast at Volcano House and continue our day. There is a good Thai food truck for dinner in Volcano, but you might consider bringing some groceries up from Hilo as it's a very quiet village with not much else happening. You have to be prepared for chilly temperatures, wind, rain, and uneven trails. Rain jacket and rain pants are a must IMO. So many tourists were wearing sandals, shorts, and garbage bag ponchos looking miserable. You need sturdy shoes or boots with vibram soles to see the best stuff. My park tier list: Kīpukapuaulu *** - Beautiful guided hike through an old growth rain forest that was mostly spared by the volcano and settlers. We got there at sunrise and had the entire hike to ourselves. Lots of cool plants and birds, good rain forest sounds. Visitor Center > Kilauea Iki > Nāhuku (out and back) *** - If it's not foggy you'll have great ledge views of the caldera and the also impressive Kilauea Iki. Nahuku is cool if you haven't seen a lava tube before, but it's quite short. The one near Hilo is better if you're prepared. You can add the crater floor and make this a loop hike. Ka'u Desert *** - You have to see some Pele's tears and Pele's hair while you're at the park!! Two of the most beautiful geologic phenomenon you'll see anywhere in the world. Sulphur Banks and Steaming Bluff ** - Easy walk over from the visitor center and back. Giggle about the suphur smells. Chain of Craters Road ** - Good if you had a rainy day like us. The highlight for me was a Nene was chilling at one of the pullouts, but the petroglyphs and vista points elevate this as well. Otherwise I don't care much for long, winding drives. Devastation Trail * - Somewhat underwhelming. Cool to see the old crater rim road interrupted by a huge cinder cone and it's a quick hike. Next time I go back I want to see Kahuku Unit and more of Mauna Loa. tiny dracula posted:I just got back yesterday from 10 days on the big island, so I'll tell you what I liked the best while it's still fresh. Thanks for this detailed post. Your tips turned out so much better than the Frommer's guidebook I bought. We went to all of the stuff I quoted and they ruled. Kailua-Kona is looking a little rough these days. I was last there as a kid in the 90s and I remembered it fondly. Today the resorts are kind of falling apart (The Royal Kona is physically falling apart lol), traffic is bad, trying to walk anywhere is sketchy because of aggressive drivers and drunks. IMO such a lost opportunity keeping Ali'i Drive open to cars. Karens and other rude boomers are EVERYWHERE. Most of the people working retail and food in town are fully checked out and you can't really blame them. Still, there are a few interesting spots to eat and there's a lot to do on that side of the island. Snorkel Bob's has never let me down. I got to play a little beach volleyball in the town center which was fun and the regulars there play at a high level (I'm pretty good and I got spanked), but the wait time for a game can be long. Worth a watch on a Friday or Saturday when there best players come along with the biggest crowd. Tournament schedules are posted here https://www.kvahawaii.org At Pu置honua O Honaunau we hiked the 1871 trail, which is kind of secondary to the main exhibit but it was one of my favorites of our whole trip. It's not long but it takes a while because of the uneven terrain. Really beautiful spot! The seahorse farm was neat. Their mission seems pretty noble. Got lots of wife points for this one. Unfortunately it was way too windy by the time we got to Punalu'u to snorkel, but we saw tons of turtles from the beach anyway! We grabbed malasadas at Punalu'u bakery too. It's not gourmet at all, but shout out to Ken's House of Pancakes in Hilo if you want a classic diner experience or some hawaiian specialties.
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Mar 2, 2023 21:00
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