#West Maui

[shutterandsentence]

Prayers for Maui! May your beautiful islands heal from this tragedy.

Photo: Maui, Hawaii

[draculasteet]

Lahaina, Maui the day after the fires.

Please consider donating- this article includes a list of places to donate:

https://www.civilbeat.org/2023/08/help-maui-fire-victims-heres-how-you-can-donate/

[teamnatural-blog]

[evevonros3n]

paia maui in december

[dionysus-complex]

the Erewhon in this neighborhood is truly such an experience

[nwbeerguide]

There's still time to support Maui Brewing Company, during West Maui Restaurant Week from March 11th thru 17th.

Press Release

Kihei, Hawai'i ... Maui Brewing Company is honored to be a participant in this year’s West Maui Restaurant Week, taking place March 11 – 17, 2024. Indulge in delectable dishes, savor mouthwatering flavors, and experience the best of Lahaina and Ka’anapali, all while helping to support our West Maui businesses and non-profits benefiting those affected by the tragic wildfires last year.

The West Maui Restaurant Week includes 10 local restaurants offering exclusive prix-fixe menus at irresistible prices. From gourmet delights to international flare, there’s something to please every palette!

Discover New Favorites: Explore the Westside's culinary landscape and revisit some of your local favorites!

Affordable Luxury: Enjoy upscale dining experiences at prices that won't empty your wallet.

Support Local: Show your love for the Westside's vibrant restaurant community and support the talented chefs and staff who make it all possible.

Participating restaurants include:

Maui Brewing Company Ka’anapali – supporting the Chef Hui initiative of local chefs and industry partners in strengthening ties between the community, farmers/ranchers, and schools

Duke’s Maui – supporting the Legacy of Aloha Foundation, benefiting TS Restaurant employees and their ‘ohana displaced my the Maui wildfires

Burger Shack at the Ritz-Carlton Kapalua – supporting the Maui Food Bank

Leilani’s on the Beach – supporting the Legacy of Aloha Foundation

Coral Reef Restaurant at the Sheraton Ka’anapali – supporting the Aloha for Sheraton Maui Relief Fund

Hale Mo’olelo at the Westin Maui Resort & Spa - supporting the TCRF Maui Relief Fund

Hula Grill - supporting the Legacy of Aloha Foundation

Umalu at the Hyatt Regency Maui – supporting the Maui Food Bank

Pizza Paradiso – supporting the Chef Hui initiative

Monkeypod Kitchen by Merriman – supporting Imua Family Services

Mark your calendars and prepare your taste buds for an unforgettable culinary journey. Don't miss out on Restaurant Week – the perfect opportunity to indulge, explore, and create delicious memories!

The MBC team are stewards of their communities and the ‘aina, and curators of the craft beer way of life. Their beers have been recognized worldwide for quality and innovation. 

For more information, visit MauiBrewing.com or follow @MauiBrewingCo on Facebook, Instagram, and X.

###

About Maui Brewing Company

Founded in 2005, Maui Brewing Company is Hawai'i’s largest craft brewery. MBC is based on Maui, with its grid-independent production brewery, restaurant and tasting room in Kihei, as well as restaurants in Kahana (Maui), Ka'anapali (Maui), Kailua (Oahu), and Waikiki (Oahu). Maui Brewing Company is available in 28 states, 1 district, and 3 international countries with more areas to follow.

[ikaikaaaron]

Real Questions

[ninetimesnetwork]

Things To Know About Living In West Maui

Things to know about living in West Maui

The Hawaiian monarch formerly vacationed on Maui's tropical northwest coast and served as the nation's capital. Today, West Maui is home to magnificent resorts, shops, restaurants, a wide range of activities, and some of the world's most breathtaking sunsets.

You may go from one sun-kissed resort to the next along the Honoapiilani Highway, each with its distinct character. The ancient whaling hamlet of Lhain is the first destination after leaving Maalaea and the Maui Ocean Center. While busy shops on Front Street and winter whale viewing make it a preferred port of call for cruise ship passengers, rustic structures commemorate its days as Hawai'i's biggest port.

On the Highway for a short while, you'll be attracted to the energetic Kaanapali Resort. A stroll along the Kaanapali Beach walk is always in order, regardless of whether you're staying nearby or are simply passing by. Families play on the beach, shoppers bustle in and out, while restaurants sit back and soak in the scenery. With the West Maui Mountains rising in the distance and providing some fantastic hiking routes, West Maui is one of the finest areas of Maui. It also boasts some of the best beaches on the island (if you don't mind the crowds) and is near Honolua Bay, Lahaina, and Ka'anapali.

On this side of the island, resorts blend into one another, and Kapalua, renowned for championship golf and exclusive vacations, is not far away. Here, the elegance is modest, and the tone is a little calmer. The original Maui resort locations are still in West Maui, where most visitors congregate today. Typically bright and dry, West Maui has ideal beach weather. Additionally, West Maui offers a variety of lodging choices, so whether you want to save money by staying in a condo or spend on a beachfront resort, you can find it there.

So, how would daily living be on west Maui?

On Front Street, Lahaina's main street, one of the most enormous banyan trees in the world, stands as a recognizable landmark. Front Street offers unlimited dining options, including gourmet dining at Lahaina Grill, outlet stores, boutiques, gift shops, surf shops, and art galleries. It also contains a movie theater. Fleetwood's (owned by Fleetwood Mac member Mick Fleetwood, a Maui resident) offers upscale fare, distinctive cocktails, and live music in a rooftop bar with a view of the setting sun over the water. At the same time, Aloha Mixed Plate serves excellent local fare like poke, saimin, and chicken katsu and offers views of even more spectacular sunsets.

What about the beaches, though?

At Kaanapali Beach and Kahekili Beach, which also boasts exceptional snorkeling conditions and family-friendly amenities, including bathrooms, showers, and a picnic area, West Maui residents may readily access large expanses of beach. Black Rock, which currently draws tourists for its snorkeling but was formerly known to early Hawaiians as Pu'u Keka'a, a holy site where the spirits of the dead leaped from the physical world into the spirit world, stands between the two. At the same time, Kapalua Bay (designated Best Beach in America by the Travel Channel and Best Beach in the World by Conde Nast Traveler magazine) offers a gorgeous, crescent-shaped Napili Bay with sweet white beaches and quiet waves.

What else can you expect to discover in west Maui?

The Mahana Ridge Trail meanders through old coffee and pineapple farms with stunning coastlines and gulch vistas along the way, while the two-mile Kapalua Coastal Trail weaves its way around four of the area's gorgeous coves. The Lahaina/Kaanapali/Kapalua shore offers endless chances for canoeing, stand-up paddling, and diving for those interested in water experiences. From here, ferries to Lanai and some of the island's top whale-watching excursions and sunset boat cruises (run by Pacific Whale Foundation and Trilogy, for example) leave. Inter-island flights are also offered from a tiny airport at Kapalua.

Front Street is closed to automobile traffic on the second Friday of every month to celebrate a town celebration with food, music, and arts & crafts. Additionally, Lahaina celebrates a Chinese Kite Festival in April and a Chinese New Year event in February. The town hosts the island's only professional fireworks show during its Fourth of July celebration. Its Halloween procession and festivities have earned the title "Mardi Gras of the Pacific."

Other local events include the Celebration of the Arts (including hula performances and other Hawaiian arts, crafts, and cuisine) each March and the Kapalua Tournament of Champions (held each January). Every June, Kapalua has a Wine and Food Festival, and for Kapalua Restaurant Week, local eateries produce unique tasting menus.

You may go on year-round excursions and stay at magnificent resorts in West Maui. The majority of visitors choose to stay longer on the island. Owning property on the island is a wise decision since it enables you to take advantage of its peace whenever and however you choose.

Property values consistently rise

Visitors are drawn to West Maui by its beauty and can return as often as they like. Some people buy a vacation home so they won't have to book hotels or rent rooms each time they visit. However, as more individuals become interested in investing in the island's assets, property values continue to increase consistently.

The island's top beaches are reachable

Tourists typically identify the island's gorgeous West Maui beach as the main draw for visiting. Consider investing in West Maui prime real estate if you love the ocean and want to visit the most excellent beaches anywhere.

A job in paradise

Because of their work responsibilities, many people are hesitant to own real estate on the island. However, the COVID-19 epidemic showed everyone working from home for a while that it is possible to work anywhere.

Living there is typically safe

Millions of tourists visit Maui Island every year, but neither the airport nor the city's main streets need to be guarded by armed soldiers. However, even though crime does exist here, it is frequently less prevalent than in other parts of the country. The island will keep you secure.

Adam Miller R(S) 81648

808-866-6606

Jessica Miller R(S) 81811

Jessica and Adam Miller are licensed real estate agents on Maui. They are with Real Broker, LLC and their team is Nine Times Network.

We take great pride in not being like every other real estate agent you'll meet. 

(more about Nine Times Network)

Mahalo for reading our blog. If you have any questions about Maui real estate or if you are looking to buy a home, sell a home or invest in Maui real estate, we would love the opportunity to speak with you.

[xtruss]

Illustration by João Fazenda

The Burning of Maui

The governor called the fires Hawaii’s “largest natural disaster” ever. They would more accurately be labelled an “unnatural disaster.”

— By Elizabeth Kolbert | August 20, 2023

The ‘alalā, or Hawaiian crow, is a remarkably clever bird. ‘Alalā fashion tools out of sticks, which they use, a bit like skewers, to get at hard-to-reach food. The birds were once abundant, but by the late nineteen-nineties their population had dropped so low that they were facing extinction. Since 2003, all the world’s remaining ‘alalā have been confined to aviaries. In a last-ditch effort to preserve the species, the San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance has been breeding the crows in captivity. The alliance keeps about a third of the birds—some forty ‘alalā—at a facility outside the town of Volcano, on the Big Island, and the rest outside the town of Makawao, on Maui. Earlier this month, the Maui population was very nearly wiped out. On the morning of August 8th, flames came within a few hundred feet of the birds’ home and would probably have engulfed it were it not for an enterprising alliance employee, one of her neighbors, and a garden hose.

According to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, “many factors” contributed to the ‘alalā’s decline, including habitat destruction, invasive species, and the effects of agriculture on the landscape. Owing to these developments, Hawaii’s native fauna in general is in crisis; the state has earned an unfortunate title as “the extinction capital of the world.” Of the nearly hundred and fifty bird species that used to be found in Hawaii and nowhere else, two-thirds are gone. Among the islands’ distinctive native snails, the losses have been even more catastrophic.

Last week, as the death toll from the fires in West Maui continued to mount—late on Friday, the number stood at a hundred and eleven—it became clear that the same “factors” that have decimated Hawaii’s wildlife also contributed to the deadliness of the blazes. Roughly a thousand people have been reported as still missing, and some two thousand homes have been destroyed or damaged. The worst-hit locality, the town of Lahaina, which lies in ruins, was built on what was once a wetland. Starting in the mid-nineteenth century, much of the vegetation surrounding the town was cleared to make way for sugar plantations. Then, when these went out of business, in the late twentieth century, the formerly cultivated acres were taken over by introduced grasses. In contrast to Hawaii’s native plants, the imported grasses have evolved to reseed after fires and, in dry times, they become highly flammable.

“The lands around Lahaina were all sugarcane from the eighteen-sixties to the late nineteen-nineties,” Clay Trauernicht, a specialist in fire ecology at the University of Hawaii at Mānoa, told the Guardian. “Nothing’s been done since then—hence the problem with invasive grasses and fire risk.”

Also contributing to the devastation was climate change. Since the nineteen-fifties, average temperatures in Hawaii have risen by about two degrees, and there has been a sharp uptick in warming in just the past decade. This has made the state more fire-prone and, at the same time, it has fostered the spread of the sorts of plants that provide wildfires with fuel. Hotter summers help invasive shrubs and grasses “outgrow our native tree species,” the state’s official Climate Change Portal notes.

As Hawaii has warmed, it has also dried out. According, again, to the Climate Change Portal, “rainfall and streamflow have declined significantly over the past 30 years.” In the weeks leading up to the fires in West Maui, parts of the region were classified as suffering from “severe drought.” Meanwhile, climate change is shifting storm tracks in the Pacific farther north. Hurricane Dora, which made history as the longest-lasting Category 4 hurricane on record in the Pacific, passed to the south of Maui and helped produce the gusts that spread the Lahaina fire at a speed that’s been estimated to be a mile per minute.

After visiting the wreckage of Lahaina, Hawaii’s governor, Josh Green, called the Maui fires the “largest natural disaster Hawaii has ever experienced.” In fact, the fires would more accurately be labelled an “unnatural disaster.” As David Beilman, a professor of geography and environment at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, recently pointed out, for most of Hawaii’s history fire simply wasn’t part of the islands’ ecology. “This Maui situation is an Anthropocene phenomenon,” he told USA Today.

A great many more unnatural disasters lie ahead. Last month was, by a large margin, the hottest July on record, and 2023 seems likely to become the warmest year on record. Two days after Lahaina burst into flames, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration issued a revised forecast for the current Atlantic hurricane season, which runs through the end of November. The agency had been predicting a “near-normal” season, with between five and nine hurricanes. But, because of record sea-surface temperatures this summer—last month a buoy in Manatee Bay, south of Miami, registered 101.1 degrees, a reading that, as the Washington Post put it, is “more typical of a hot tub than ocean water”—noaa is now projecting that the season will be “above normal,” with up to eleven hurricanes. Rising sea levels and the loss of coastal wetlands mean that any hurricanes that make landfall will be that much more destructive.

A few days after noaa revised its forecast, officials ordered the evacuation of Yellowknife, the capital of Canada’s Northwest Territories. A wildfire burning about ten miles away would, they feared, grow to consume the city. The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation called the evacuation order “extraordinary.” This summer has been Canada’s worst wildfire season on record, and, at times, the smoke has spread all the way to Europe. There are currently something like a thousand active fires in the country.

Two days after the Yellowknife evacuation was ordered, another Pacific hurricane—Hilary—intensified into a Category 4 storm. Hilary was being drawn north by a “heat dome” of high pressure over the central Plains, which was expected to bring record temperatures to parts of the Midwest. The storm’s unusual track put some twenty-six million people in four states—California, Utah, Nevada, and Arizona—under flash-flood watches.

How well humanity will fare on the new planet it is busy creating is an open question. Homo sapiens is a remarkably clever species. So, too, was the ‘alalā. ♦

— Published in the Print Edition of the August 28, 2023, New Yorker Issue, with the Headline “Fire Alarm.”

[sakamotoproperties]

Why West Maui is the Perfect Place for Your Luxury Lifestyle

West Maui is a place of natural beauty and rich history. Its stunning mountain ranges, pristine beaches, and ancient sites and temples offer visitors a unique glimpse into the past.

[writervictoriawest]

Angry

I am angry at fires. Angry at devastation. Angry at tragedy. Angry at loss. Angry at sickness. Angry at incompetence. Angry at corruption. Angry at greed. Angry at violence. Angry at vitriol. Angry at obscenity. Angry at intolerance. Angry at insolence. Angry at indolence. Angry at decay. I am angry. I am angry. I am angry.

[micahsolusod]

Absolutely crushed by the news coming out of Maui right now. Intense brushfires have scorched the island forcing residents to evacuate. There have been several deaths and no power on the West side of the island.

Here are a few local charities that are accepting donations (UPDATED 08/1//2023):

Maui Rapid Response is a citizen-based disaster response team. They are posting lists of needs on their Instagram account. https://www.instagram.com/mauirapidresponse/

The Maui Humane Society is asking to help foster any animals in distress. They are also accepting pet food, litter, kennels, and donations. www.mauihumanesociety.org

Global Giving has partners on the ground helping survivors access food, shelter, and other emergency services. https://www.globalgiving.org/projects/hawaii-wildfire-relief-fund/

World Central Kitchen has teams on Maui offering food and water to evacuees and first responders. https://wck.org/

Maui Strong Fund is currently being used to support communities affected by the wildfires on Maui. https://www.hawaiicommunityfoundation.org/maui-strong

New Life Kahaku is a local non-profit is accepting donations for food and supplies. www.newlifekahuku.com

[terrible-eel]

I had just posted two new links of events occurring on Maui but I need to highlight a very specific situation happening right now.

Maui has another harbor, Ma'alaea, where a lot of two and three story boats are docked. They exist for tourists to go snorkeling and whale watching. They go on usually two cruises a day. Some go as far as the neighboring islands. These boats have the capacity to go to Lahaina and back probably 4 to 6 times. But instead of shipping over supplies to the local families who are trapped in West Maui, because the American Military won't let them leave and won't bring them supplies, these boats are taking tourists out to snorkel in Lahaina, right near the fire.

In contrast, people have created makeshift long boats and kanoes and piled supplies in them and are taking them out by jetskis to the private docks in Lahaina. These boats are 3 to 5 times smaller and can only bring in so many supplies at a time. People need to understand that the crisis does not stop with the fires. The humanitarian crisis starts and ends with the local people who are experiencing the parasite that is tourism. Write to the Governor of Hawai'i. Tell them that there needs to be changes to ecological laws. Tell them to crack down on tourism. Offer advice, ways to better the economy without tourism. Tell people to stop behaving like these tourists and money hungry business owners.

This video is an example of a tourist boat.

And this video is an example of what the supply boats look like.

This is a list of gofundmes and other donations to individuals who need aid!

Please if nothing else share this in every way you can.

[vidavalor]

I really wish the paparazzi would leave Crowley and Aziraphale alone.