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Kauai is Hawaii's Garden Isle, a place where children still grow-up walking barefoot to the general store, where surfers are the local celebrities and waking up to the sweet smell of rain and ginger is just another day. A twenty minute plane ride from Honolulu and you're there. The Island of Kauai boasts amazingly varied landscapes- from a dry, desert-like south shore to a lush and rainy north shore. Feel like you can't possibly imagine how amazingly beautiful Kauai may be? You're actually more familiar with the Island than you think: Blue Hawaii? Jurassic Park? 6 Days, 7 Nights? Catch-up with Kauai on the silver screen after you catch-up on Kauai with us- we've got your preview queued up.
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The east side of O'ahu, commonly referred to as the Windward Side, stretches from the cliffs of Makapu'u at the southern tip of the Island all the way up to the northernmost point of O'ahu in Kahuku. As you travel up the coast, the landscape alternates between arid cliffs and lush, green mountains but the one constant is the beautiful stretch of beaches that line this side's shores. These are O'ahu's best beaches: It's not only us, numerous magazines, travel shows and even Dr. Beach himself say so! And what else is a beautiful beach good for besides sunbathing and a swim? A wedding! Why get married at a hotel on Waikiki beach when you can get married at an estate on one of the world's best beaches? We think there's no argument there.
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Waikiki: It's the first place people think of when they think of Hawaii. Images of hula girls dancing up and down the beach, a throng of bronzed beach boys on their surfboards, Mai Tai's for breakfast, you know. When you fly into Honolulu and look out the window as you descend beneath the clouds, you may...gasp. Waikiki is like a mini Las Vegas, minus the billboards and gambling. Kalakaua Avenue, the main drag through Waikiki, is a people pumping, music thumping aorta through the kooky island wonderland that is Waikiki. So if you like being around a plethora of tourists, riding on tour buses to touristy destinations and being surrounded by tens of thousands of, you guessed it, T-O-U-R-I-S-T-S...then Waikiki is your place. Well, there are a few hidden gems in this maze of people, sun and sand so hang on (or hang ten) and we'll take you there.
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O'ahu's West Shore is often overlooked by tour guides, travel books and tourists alike. Why, you ask? It's a little gritty- a place that beholds its own kind of beauty. The Wai'anae Coast is O'ahu's little sister, often overlooked, but its beaches and mountains are relatively free of the kind of development seen on the rest of the Island. Its landscape is beautiful, uncompromising and innocent nonetheless. The west side of O'ahu is much drier than the east side and has a desert-like feeling with the deep blue ocean as its oasis. The ridgelines of the Wai'anae Coast march down from their lush peaks, giving way to crumbling hillsides of scorched pili grass and Kiawe trees by the time they meet the ocean. Sunset is the most picturesque time of day when the sun turns the water to a beautiful golden color and the browns and green of the craggy hillsides glow.
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If you've got a trail of paparazzi hounding you (let's just imagine for a second, eh?), where would you go to have an Island-style wedding away from it all? We think Molokai is the answer- whether you're a celebrity evading the lens or an adventurous couple looking for an equally adventurous wedding destination. What's this isolated island destination like? Molokai is smaller than small-town USA. On the southern, leeward shore is the Island's biggest town, Kaunakakai, with a three-block business district of mom-and-pop stores, a pair of gas stations, one art gallery, and plenty of meter-free parking. Drivers in the few passing cars wave at each other; on an island with little over 7,000 residents (40% of them of Hawaiian descent), chances are they're acquainted. More travelers have begun to discover that Molokai is Hawaii's most laid-back island; indeed, there are few better therapies than getting a hot loaf of sweet bread from Kanemitsu's Bakery in the morning, watching surfers catch wave after wave at Halawa Bay, or sipping a cocktail in the oceanfront bar of the tiki-style Hotel Molokai.
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It's 6am and you're at the top of the world, watching the most amazing sunrise of your life: It's the dawn of a new day, your wedding day. Where are you? 10,000 feet above the Earth at the summit of Hale'akala- by the afternoon you'll be married on the beach in Ka'anapali. From the chilly summit of Hale'akala to the scorching beaches of the south and west shores, Maui has it all. Also known as the "Valley Isle", Maui has quickly become the State's most popular wedding destination. The scenery isn't the only draw: The Island's laidback vibe, variety of five-star resorts and vacation homes and availability of experienced wedding vendors has earned itself a reputation as the go-to wedding destination in Hawaii. Beyond the glitz of exclusive Wailea and luxurious Ka'anapali, Maui still maintains a true down-home island feeling. To get you acquainted with all that Maui has to offer, we'll start with the Island's most well known locales first and save the little known gems for last.
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If you're looking to get away from it all but require five-star luxury in order to do so, Lanai is the place to be. Its five-star luxury comes in the form of two (count 'em, two) Four Seasons Resorts, more on those later. The Island is known as the "Pineapple Island"- its slopes once covered with thousands of acres of pineapple, its people entirely devoted to cultivating this fruit that has come to symbolize Hawaii. Lanai City (i.e. the only city on Lanai) grew out of these fields in 1922 when the Dole Company bought the Island and started the largest pineapple plantation in the world. Today the plantations are gone and in their place stand groves of Norfolk and Cook Pines- originally planted during the hey-days of pineapple, the pines tower a hundred feet over the town below, a thick fog clinging to their dark green needles in the early dawn. With little over 3,000 residents, you and your friends and family could have the Island (almost) to yourselves.
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Which island is bigger than all of the other Islands of Hawaii combined? Drum roll, please... the Big Island! We kid you not. The largest Island in the State of Hawaii, the Island we locals affectionately call the "Big Island", is named... Hawaii. It's true: The Big Island is named Hawaii, the Island of Hawaii is called the Big Island. You still with us? Good, let's get on with it. The Big Island has the most varied landscape of all the Islands, from snow-capped Mauna Kea (meaning "White Mountain" in Hawaiian) to the active volcano Kilauea to black sand beaches in Ka'u to the south and rolling green hills in Waimea to the north. You can visit almost all of these landscapes on a single Island in a single day, though we recommend you take your time and take in all that the Big Island has to offer.
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