As you drive along the bypass road outside Lahaina, you’ll see several hand-made signs.
“Respect the locals.” “Let Lahaina grieve.” And more.
The sentiments are important. It’s only been three months and a few days since wildfires ripped through this once tranquil and beautiful seaside town, and many people are still living in hotels. Many others are still grieving lost parents and cherished uncles and aunties. Far too many children died in the fires, an unimaginable horror that a parent can never recover from.
When we were on Maui recently, my wife chatted briefly with a hotel worker who said she’s still having a hard time.
“I sometimes get guff from a guest about something, and I just say ‘Stop,’” she said, holding out her hand like a police officer at an intersection.
“My parents are in their 70’s and we had to run for our lives during the fire. We turned around and the flames were maybe 200 feet behind us.”
People need time to grieve. But Lahaina and Maui aren’t immune from fiscal reality. In order to feed themselves and their families, they need to work. On an island where something like 80% of the income is directly or indirectly related to visitor spending, that means welcoming tourists back to the beaches and restaurants and attractions that have consistently made Maui one of the world’s favorite vacation places.
It may take years for Maui tourism to get back to where it once was. The Hawaiian islands in general were just beginning to recover from COVID-19 when the fires hit Lahaina (and also devastated areas near the town of Kula, in what’s called “upcountry.”) But I found on a recent visit that things were starting to bounce back.
The streets were busy in the funky, central Maui town of Paia when I visited. I also couldn’t find a parking spot on either of the main streets in the upcountry town of Makawao, where you’ll find great art galleries, clothing stores and casual restaurants.
I stopped in at Sherri Reeve Gallery and Gifts and chatted briefly with a woman named Eloise, who was working that day.
Makawao, Maui, Hawaii. JIM BYERS PHOTO
“It’s been busy,” she said. “Makawao is doing well.”
Eloise told me her son was displayed by the fires and is living at the Royal Lahaina Resort in Ka’anapali, a popular area for visitors.
“He’s okay. He’s got a place to live and he’s getting fed.”
“The community is really strong, so it’s great,” she said. “Lahaina is so resilient. When the fires happened the help first came from locals. It was FEMA or the government, it was the people.”
Another shop worker told me there’s a lot of community spirit in Makawao.
“We’re all doing our part. People are volunteering all over the place and going to local restaurants to help keep them going.”
At Makawao’s Maui Hands gallery, owner Panna Speas Cappelli told me she lost her store in Lahaina in the fire. Luckily for her, she still has shops in Makawao, Paia and Wailea in South Maui.
“It’s been super slow but it’s picking up. I think Paia has become the new Lahaina.”
It’s a pretty valid comparison. Like Lahaina in its recent heyday, Paia is a funky waterfront town with wooden shops, plenty of surfers, and super-casual shops and dining places.
Panna Speas Cappelli at the Maui Hands gallery in Makawao. JIM BYERS PHOTO
At Joey’s Kitchen, a popular restaurant in Napili in West Maui, I noted only a few empty tables on a Wednesday at lunch time.
“Lunch time it’s like this. Dinner is really getting busy, too, “ one of the workers told me. “It’s good to see.”
Jasmine Witt operates At Witt’s End Jasmine’s Boutique in the Kahana Gateway Plaza, a few minutes north of Ka’anapali. She had a store in Lahaina but it was destroyed during the fires.
“It’s still personally very hard for many people,” she said. “The housing situation is still difficult, although the loss of life is obviously much worse.”
Witt told me her Kahana store is a little busier than it was a few weeks ago.
“I’d say it comes in fits and starts,” she said.
The restaurants are busy, but Witt said that’s kind of by default, because so many were dining places were lost in Lahaina.
“People used to have a lot more options.”
From what I could see on my visit, the Kihei-Wailea area seems to be doing quite well. It was much quieter than normal on the beaches of West Maui when we were there in early November.
In a telephone interview last week, Kalani Ka’ana’ana, chief brand officer for the Hawai’i Tourism Authority, told me he thinks Maui’s recovery is going reasonably well, but that it’s still slow on West Maui.
Ka’ana’ana said many island residents were reluctant to embrace the return of visitors.
“They were maybe thinking about some kind of pre-pandemic wave that would inundate them. But that hasn’t been the case.”
“There will always be a vocal minority who say, “We don’t want anybody. Pragmatic folks recognize tourism is the lifeblood of the economy at the moment. To pay bills and mortgages, they need to work. One way to do that is a return to visitors.”
Ka’ana’ana said the staged reopening plan put forward by Maui Mayor Richard Bissen and Hawai’i governor Josh Green has worked well.
“I think everyone is cognizant that we don’t want it to come back like it was. We’re really interested in hearing from community members about what they think tourism should look like in the future.
Duke’s Maui Beach House, Ka’anapali Beach. Duke’s Beach House Photo
“We need to restore infrastructure the right way so we can handle our visitors, and we have to improve the quality of life of our residents.”
With many visitors heading to other islands instead of vacationing on Maui, numbers have been good for Kaua’i, O’ahu and the island of Hawai’i.
“For the first nine months of 2023, we had 7.3 million visitors to the state. Total arrivals were down 6.5% compared to the first nine months of 2019, but up 6.4% from 2022,” Ka’ana’ana said.
“We’ve seen pretty strong visitation to other islands. It’s still weak internationally, however, particularly from Japan.”
One issue I hadn’t thought about until I got there two weeks ago was the impact of the Maui fires on the economy of Lana’i. Until the fires came, there were several ferries every day between Lahaina and Lana’i. Now there’s a ferry from the harbor in Maalaea, which isn’t a major destination for visitors.
One store owner in Lana’i City told me one-half of her business used to come from Maui day trippers.
Most of that is now gone, but she does notice a new group of visitors coming from Kihei and Wailea, popular tourist areas that find the Maalaea ferry more convenient than the drive to Lahaina used to be.
As my wife were leaving Maui after our recent visit, we put our suitcases into the agricultural inspection machine, something all passengers heading to the mainland have to do.
The inspector turned to us and asked, “How was your trip?”
“Oh, it’s always great to come to your beautiful island,” my wife replied. “We love it here so much.”
“I’m glad you had a great time,” he said. “Come back soon.
“We need you.”
IF YOU GO
If you visit Maui, please do so respectfully. It’s not a time to be loud and boisterous. Don’t pry into people’s personal lives, but please do leave a generous tip for hotel and restaurant workers. Do not try to visit Lahaina and do not take pictures of damaged areas. If you can, please volunteer to help at the Maui Food Bank (they’re doing a great job) or some other charity. And please make a donation to a charitable group. The Hawai’i Community Foundation’s Maui Strong campaign is a very worthy cause.
