just a small area, perhaps only a few square feet in size,
where you’re most content, most relaxed — a place where
you can hear yourself, and trust what you hear; a place
where you’re most like the person you know yourself to be,
or at least most like the person you want to be?
If so, then my spot is a few square yards of sand in front
of an old twisted palm tree on Keawakapu Beach in
south Maui.
It doesn’t hurt that the water is lapping at my ankles
and the view is of the setting sun burning up the sky
over the neighbouring island of Lana’i. I’ve known this
spot for 30 years. For 10 years, my home was just back
from the sand — my hammock hung from that twisted
palm. For the past 20 years, I’ve done all I can to return
to this very spot on a regular basis. Perhaps it’s some
kind of personal vortex or energy field or perhaps there’s
some other New Age type explanation I don’t generally
believe in, but no matter, this is it — my spot. It simply
offers me something the rest of the world can’t. It’s ever
abiding, yet constantly changing — forever being altered
by the sea.
That feeling of change could apply to the rest of the
island as well. Of course, Maui, like all of the Hawaiian
Islands, has come of age since I first arrived in the
1980s as a very young man. That quiet island I landed
on morphed into a super power destination, with all
its muscled-up attractions, and then into a grandiose
playground for the wealthy that went through tough
times when boom turned to bust a decade ago. Recently,
a welcome restraint, a casual sense of hipster aloha, has
begun to emerge — particularly at the Andaz Maui at
Wailea Resort, where I station myself. And yet the old
Maui I’ve always known is still here too. In my spot
— and elsewhere.High up on Haleakalā — the 10,000ft volcano that
dominates the island — the ‘upcountry’ community of
Kula feels forever unchanged.
“We live in our own little bubble up here,” John
‘Sheldon’ Wallau tells me. We’re leaning against the
doorway of his Keokea Gallery, watching the occasional
pickup truck roll past. The gallery is one of just a handful
of shops on this lightly travelled part of the island. For
the past 27 years, Sheldon has often been found standing
in this doorway accompanied by his scruffy dog, Ipo. He’s
the proprietor, sole artist on display, and neighbourhood
philosopher. “Not everyone is happy living at the end of a
dirt road — but I am.”
Far from the sea, the air is cooler up here and the land
more fertile. Jacaranda trees explode in purple bloom,
nene birds flit freely, horses graze lush pastures. Beside
Sheldon’s gallery is Grandma’s Coffee House, a small,
plantation-style shed, serving my favourite cup of coffee
on Maui — and worth the drive just for that. Sipping my
second cup out on the porch — another of my favourite
spots — a red-crested cardinal hops between tables. My
mind rests, and I gaze down thousands of feet across the
slope of the volcano to the sea. Intermittent clouds below
me paint the water shades of blue. Owner Al Franco
walks out of the shop. He’s a native, and like many
Hawaiians I know, he has an easy-going demeanour
that masks a fierce pride in family and community. Al
knows just about everyone in the place this morning
— each of his conversations punctuated with laughter.�s it �os�ible t ha� �here's one
single s�ot in t he world,
92 natgeotraveller.co.uk
HAWAII