The islands of HAWAII, with their volcanoes, palm-fringed beaches, verdant valleys, glorious rainbows and awesome cliffs, hold some of the most spectacularly beautiful scenery on earth. However, despite their isolation, two thousand miles out in the Pacific, they belong very definitely to the United States.
If you expect your South Seas idyll to be completely unspoiled, forget it; the fantasy of a dream holiday in Paradise remains firmly rooted in the creature comforts of home. With six million tourists per year, including honeymooners from all over the world, frequent fliers cashing in their mileage and more than a million Japanese, the islands can seem like a gigantic theme park. Worldwide recession, and the sobering impact of Hurricane Iniki on Kauai in September 1992, may have combined to slow resort development, but you can't help but be aware of how much of what was unique has gone.
Honolulu, by far the largest city of the fiftieth state, and with its resort annex of Waikiki also the main tourist center, is on Oahu. The biggest island, Hawaii itself, is known as the Big Island in a vain attempt to avoid confusion. Maui and Kauai also attract mass tourism, while smaller Molokai remains far quieter.
The islands share a similar topography and climate. Ocean winds from the northeast shed their rain on the windward coast, keeping it wet and green; the southwest, leeward (or "Kona") coasts can be almost barren, and so make ideal locations for big resorts. Rainfall is heaviest from December to March, but temperatures remain consistent throughout the year at between 70°F and 85°F.
Christmas and midsummer are far more expensive times to visit than the "off-seasons" of September to December and April to May, with top-range hotels charging as much as fifty percent extra. A visit to Hawaii doesn't have to cost a fortune, however; there are plenty of budget facilities if you know where to look. The one major expense you really can't avoid, except possibly on Oahu, is car rental – rates are very reasonable, but gas is pricey.
Hawaii Volcanoes Natl Park
The Big Island's southernmost volcanoes, Mauna Loa and Kilauea, jointly constitute HAWAII VOLCANOES NATIONAL PARK, thirty miles from Hilo and eighty from Kailua. It's possibly the most dramatic of all the US national parks; as well as two active volcanoes, of which at least one is likely to be erupting, it includes desert, arctic tundra, and the Wao Kele O Puna rainforest (where a much-opposed project is attempting to tap geothermal energy).
Evidence is everywhere of the awesome power of the volcanoes to create and destroy; no map can keep up with the latest whims of the lava flow. Whole towns have been engulfed, and what were once prized beachfront properties lie buried hundreds of yards back from the sea. No one knows quite where they are – there's nowhere for surveyors to get their bearings. There are no towns left on the southern coast. The Hawaiians abandoned their villages 150 years ago, after a succession of terrible tidal waves; now the Americans too have been driven out.
