5 Days in the Big Island of Hawaii

Start up the hill from Kailua-Kona in Hōlualoa, a village strung along one road in the Kona coffee belt. The coffee story starts here: a missionary, Rev. Samuel Ruggles, brought cuttings to the district in 1828, and when the coffee market crashed in 1899 the plantation owners leased small plots to their workers, mostly Japanese families. Their descendants, joined by Filipino, American and European newcomers, still run the roughly 800 small farms, many of them under five acres.

Park and walk the main street for its small galleries and farm shops, and buy one bag of coffee here only if the label says 100% Kona Coffee. Hawaii allows a Kona blend to hold as little as 10 percent Kona, with the rest imported. Cooler air up here is a relief after the coast.

Fifteen minutes south, Greenwell Farms in Kealakekua traces its roots to 1850, when the Englishman Henry Nicholas Greenwell arrived in Kona. His family helped turn Kona coffee into a recognized brand. The farm runs free tours every day from 8:30 am to about 2:30 pm, and you follow the bean from cherry to cup: the pulper, the drying racks (hoshidana) and the roaster.

The tasting counter at the end is where the farm earns its money, which is fair. Try the peaberry, the rounder single bean that grows alone inside some cherries. Cherries are picked by hand from about August to January; the rest of the year you see flowers or green fruit.

A 20-minute drive downhill from Greenwell is Kealakekua Bay, a marine life conservation district and the most historically loaded bay in Hawaii. The name means the god's pathway. In January 1779 Captain James Cook sailed in during the Makahiki, a season of peace, and was welcomed. A mast broke in a storm, the ships came back on 12 February, relations frayed, and Cook was killed on the north shore. A white monument stands there, built in 1874.

You can't drive to the monument. State rules allow it only by the steep Kaʻawaloa Trail from the uplands or with a guided kayak or boat tour by a permitted company, and permitted vessels may not land on the flat or launch from the Nāpōʻopoʻo wharf. From the road end at Nāpōʻopoʻo you can still look across the bay at the monument and the cliffs where chiefs were buried, and Hikiau Heiau, the temple platform at the south end. It is sacred: look, but do not step on it.

Seven miles south, Puʻuhonua o Hōnaunau was a place of refuge. In old Hawaii, breaking a kapu (a sacred law) meant death, unless you could reach a puʻuhonua and be absolved by a priest. Defeated warriors and non-combatants fled here in times of war. A great stone wall still separates the refuge from the chiefs' grounds, and the Hale o Keawe, a temple first built around 1650 to hold the bones of ruling chiefs, stands beside it, rebuilt.

Walk the loop slowly: the royal fishponds, the reconstructed thatched buildings and the lava shoreline. Come late in the afternoon, when the day-trip buses have gone.

Next door, Two Step is Kona's best easy shore snorkel. You walk onto a lava shelf, step down two ledges into deep clear water, and within a few strokes are over coral and fish, often with turtles. It sits at the Hōnaunau Bay boat ramp, which the park says is outside its boundary and run by the County. Don't swim at the cove inside the park, and don't change in the park's toilets.

There is no lifeguard and the entry can be rough in swell. Wear water shoes, because the lava is sharp. Spinner dolphins rest in the bay by day, and a federal rule (2021) bans swimming with them or coming within 50 yards (46 m). Keep 10 feet (3 m) from turtles.

Kona's famous night: floating on the surface in the dark while giant manta rays glide and loop beneath you, feeding. The operators shine lights into the water, which draw plankton, and the plankton draw the mantas. There are two main sites, Garden Eel Cove near the airport and Keauhou Bay. It can be magical, but it is a managed show with a lot of people in the water, and sightings are not guaranteed.

Choose the operator carefully. The accepted rules are simple: stay on the surface with legs level, hold lights pointing down, and never touch, chase or ride a manta, because touching strips the mucus that protects them from infection.

Hāpuna Beach is a long, wide curve of white sand, and the best of the few white-sand beaches on this coast. The coastal expert "Dr. Beach" named it the best beach in America in 1993 and again in 2021. It has lifeguards, showers and shade pavilions.

It is also open to the ocean and has no reef. In high surf the shore break is dangerous: the park says waves over 3 feet are for experts only and everyone else should stay out of the water. On a calm morning it's a wonderful place to swim; on a big day, watch from the sand. Kaunaʻoa Beach, a smaller crescent beside the Mauna Kea resort, is the next bay north.

Ten minutes north at Kawaihae is Puʻukoholā Heiau, "temple on the hill of the whale", the last major temple of ancient Hawaii. Kamehameha built it in 1790 and 1791 on the advice of a priest, Kapoukahi, who said that a temple to the war god Kūkāʻilimoku would bring him the island. The stones were passed hand to hand along a human chain about 14 miles long from Pololū Valley, and the platform was finished within a year.

When it was done, Kamehameha invited his rival Keōua Kuahuʻula to talk peace. As Keōua stepped ashore he and his party were killed, and their bodies dedicated the temple. Kamehameha went on to unite the islands. Walk the short trail around the platform and on to the site of the house of John Young, Kamehameha's British adviser.

Cross the shoulder of the Kohala Mountains to Hāwī, a one-street former plantation town of galleries, a few cafes and a small farmers market. It's a pleasant lunch stop, nothing more. The air is cooler, and the green is a shock after the lava coast.

Eat a plate lunch on a bench and look in one gallery.

The highway ends at a lookout over Pololū Valley, the northernmost of the valleys that cut into the Kohala Mountains. It was once a taro-farming valley known for a variety with crimson stems, and the stones of the Puʻukoholā temple came from here. The view over the sea cliffs and the black sand beach is the reward by itself.

A steep trail of about 0.6 mile (1 km) drops roughly 400 feet to the beach, and the climb back takes twice as long as the descent. The beach is black sand mixed with boulders, and the sea is not for swimming: rip currents and surf are common.

Back in Kailua-Kona, spend the evening on Aliʻi Drive, the sea road lined with restaurants and old royal sites. Mokuʻaikaua Church, finished in 1837, is the oldest Christian church in the islands, built partly from the stones of a nearby temple, and Hulihēʻe Palace across the road was built in 1838 by Governor Kuakini.

The palace is open Wednesday to Saturday only, so on this plan you see it from outside. Walk the sea wall at sunset and choose a restaurant with a view. Kamakahonu, the small sheltered bay by the pier, was a royal residence.

Waipiʻo Valley is where Hawaiian kings lived. The chief Līloa ruled from here, and so did his son ʻUmi, who went on to unite the island by force. The valley floor lies almost 2,000 feet below the rim, a cleft of taro fields, a river and a black sand beach, closed in by waterfalls.

The rim lookout is a free paved platform with no permit needed, and it shows most of the valley floor. The road down is another matter. Since February 2022 Waipiʻo Valley Road has been closed to visitors under a County emergency rule, renewed about every 60 days: residents, Native Hawaiian practitioners and permitted tour operators may drive it, and walking down is banned for everyone. Hiʻilawe Falls shows as a thin thread at the back of the valley on a clear day, and the hike to it crosses private land. For the valley floor you need a permitted guided tour.

Back in Honokaʻa, an old plantation town on the Hāmākua coast, stop at Tex Drive-In for a malasada. The Portuguese fried dough, brought to Hawaii by plantation workers, is served hot and rolled in sugar, with or without a custard filling. Eat it still warm, then look around the town. The old theater and the shopfronts show what a plantation town looked like.

Twenty minutes before Hilo is ʻAkaka Falls State Park, where a short paved loop, about 0.4 mile, leads through tropical forest to a viewpoint. ʻAkaka drops 442 feet into a gorge, and the loop is easy enough for anybody.

It's the best waterfall you can see in 45 minutes, which is why it gets busy. The light is better before noon, and the stream is fuller after rain, which is most days on this side. The fee is by credit card only.

Hilo's market sits at Kamehameha Avenue and Mamo Street, downtown, and it's open seven days a week from 7 am to 3 pm. The big days are Wednesday and Saturday, when more than 150 vendors fill the stalls; the other days have 50 to 80. A Wednesday is the best day to be here, which is why this plan is built around it.

Walk it for tropical fruit you won't recognize, flowers, honey, coconuts and local crafts. Buy lilikoʻi (passion fruit), apple bananas and a bag of lychee in season, and eat lunch from the prepared-food stalls.

Rainbow Falls, Waiānuenue, "rainbow water", is an 80-foot fall on the Wailuku River just above town. Rainbows form in its mist on sunny mornings around 10 am, so it's a morning stop that you'll see in the afternoon only if the sun is out. In Hawaiian tradition the cave behind it was the home of the goddess Hina.

Then go to Liliʻuokalani Gardens, 24 acres of Edo-style Japanese garden with ponds, stone bridges and a footbridge to little Coconut Island, built between 1917 and 1919 on land Queen Liliʻuokalani donated. Hilo's bayfront has been destroyed by tsunamis twice.

Mauna Kea is about 13,800 feet (4,205 m) high, the highest point in Hawaii, and its summit is one of the best places on Earth to look at the sky. The Visitor Information Station sits at 9,200 feet, an hour from Hilo up the Saddle Road (about 35 miles), and is open 9 am to 9 pm daily. It runs free nightly stargazing with telescopes, so you don't need to go higher to see the Milky Way. Eat dinner in Hilo, leave around 5 pm, and expect to be back in Hilo after 10 pm. At this height, take it slowly and drink water, because altitude can bring headaches and nausea.

The summit is a different undertaking. The road above the station is unpaved and steep, and 4WD is required, in low range. Children under 13, pregnant women and anyone in poor health are told not to go above the station. The summit area is closed from 30 minutes after sunset to 30 minutes before sunrise, so the stars are seen from the station. Most rental contracts forbid driving above the station even in a 4WD, so read yours; the practical way up is a permitted tour (Summit Adventures advertises from 330 USD for ages 13 and up).

The mountain is sacred. In Hawaiian tradition it is Mauna a Wākea, and only the highest-ranking chiefs once climbed to its peak. Whether the telescopes on it should stand there is still debated. Stay on the paved lot, stay quiet, and don't take stones.

Start at the park's visitor center on the Kīlauea summit, and ask a ranger what is open today (the Kīlauea Visitor Center is being renovated, see the status tip). The Jaggar Museum, damaged in the 2018 earthquakes, is gone for good.

Kīlauea's summit has erupted in short episodes inside Halemaʻumaʻu crater since 23 December 2024. Lava fountains play for a few hours, then stop for days or weeks. You can't plan for a fountain, only for the chance of one: check the USGS Hawaiian Volcano Observatory daily update and the NPS alerts page the night before. The eruption area itself is closed, and the open rim overlooks are where you watch from.

A short loop through a fern forest leads into Nāhuku, a lava tube formed when the outside of a river of lava cooled and the molten rock inside drained away. You walk upright through the dark tunnel.

It is one of the park's busiest short walks, and parking is tiny, so go before 9 am or after 5 pm. The tube is open around the clock but lit only from 8 am to 8 pm, so bring a headlamp or a phone light, and mind the low ceiling.

In November and December 1959, Kīlauea Iki held a lava lake and a fountain that set a record height for Hawaii. The crater is 801 feet deep. When the lava cooled, it left a flat black floor, and you can now walk across it, past steam vents and the cinder cone of Puʻu Puaʻi.

The loop (about 3.3 miles or 5.3 km from the overlook, with a 400-foot climb back, two to three hours) drops through rainforest to the crater floor. It is the most interesting short hike in the park: the floor steams where rain seeps into the still-warm rock. Stay on the marked route.

Volcano village, just outside the park gate, is where you get lunch near the summit. The houses sit in rainforest, the air is cool at 4,000 feet, and it rains often. Pick a cafe, then try the Volcano Winery, where a classic tasting is six one-ounce pours of wine made from grapes, fruit blends and honey, plus estate teas.

Use this hour to rest, because the best viewing is later. If you're staying in the village tonight, check in and warm up before the evening.

The Chain of Craters Road drops 19 miles (31 km) from the rim of Kīlauea to the sea through pit craters, old lava flows and rainforest down to the sea. It is a drive where the landscape is the show.

The famous stop at the bottom has changed. The Hōlei Sea Arch, a 90-foot natural arch at the end of the road, collapsed in late September 2026, and the park warns that the cliffs around it are unstable. Stay behind the barriers: the National Park Service says people walking into the closed area risk falling into the sea. The coast is still worth the drive. Check that the road is open on the day.

After dark, return to the summit overlooks. Uēkahuna, on the rim where the Jaggar Museum used to stand, and the Kīlauea Overlook at the steam vents are two of the open viewpoints, and the NPS map lists others. If the volcano is fountaining, you will see the lava and the glow in the plume above the crater. During a pause there may be only a faint red glow from lava that has already erupted.

Uēkahuna is a sacred place for Native Hawaiians, and the park is returning it to something quieter, with the buildings gone and the old stone walls left. Watch in silence. Lots fill on eruption nights, so arrive early and have a plan B (the park says Uēkahuna and Kīlauea Overlook usually have more space than the east side). Dress warmly: the summit is cool and often wet.

Punaluʻu is the black sand beach most people come for: basalt ground fine by the sea, with green sea turtles resting on the sand and hawksbill turtles nesting nearby. The name means spring [water] diver, after fresh water that wells up in the bay. Keep 10 feet (3 m) from the turtles, never touch them, and don't swim here: the water is rocky and rough.

Check the park's status before you drive here (see the status tip). If it is shut, you have already seen black sand at Pololū.

Sixteen miles on, at mile marker 70.5 on Highway 11, is the Kahuku Unit of the national park, open only Thursday to Sunday from 8 am to 4 pm, so it works on a Friday. It's a former ranch on the slope of Mauna Loa, and it has none of the crowds of Kīlauea.

Walk the short Puʻu o Lokuana cinder cone loop (0.4 mile, 130 feet of climb) for the view of the Kaʻū coast down to South Point, or the 2.6-mile Palm Trail through the pastures, past the 1868 fissure and across a lava channel. After two days of crowds, the quiet is the point.

Turn off Highway 11 between mile markers 69 and 70 onto South Point Road and follow it south to Ka Lae, the southernmost point of the 50 states. It's a windy lava headland with cliffs and open ocean in every direction.

Come here for the emptiness, not for sights. The road is narrow and runs through pasture. It's also the trailhead for the green sand beach, and the lot is small and fills on busy mornings.

Papakōlea is one of only two green sand beaches in the world, the other being in the Galápagos. Its color comes from olivine, a mineral eroded out of a collapsed volcanic ash cone called Puʻu Mahana, and heavier than ordinary sand, so it stays while the rest washes away. The sand is more olive and glittery than lawn-green, but still strange.

Here are the rules, honestly. The land belongs to the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands, which does not allow vehicles on the road. The trucks that offer paid rides from the lot are operating illegally, and their ruts, some more than 8 feet deep, have wrecked the land. Walk: it's about 2.5 miles each way, two to three hours round trip, and the last part is a climb down the lava cliff on the west side of the bay. There is no shade, water or lifeguard, and the surf can be rough.

From South Point it's about 64 miles (104 km) and well over two hours to Kailua-Kona by the Kona coast road. With the hike you will arrive after sunset for much of the year, so catch the light at Ka Lae instead. Park near the pier, walk out on the sea wall, and eat fish on Aliʻi Drive: grilled ono or mahi-mahi, or a plate of poke if you haven't had one.