Timeless Hawaii perseveres in rural Molokai, a peaceful oasis with many Hawaiians and few tourists, snuggled between Oahu and Maui.
Hawaii's longest beach lies on Molokai's western flank. Perfect combers crash on Papohaku's 2 1/2 miles of white sand with nary a footprint. Then, as it follows the shoreline east, Molokai's lone highway passes Hawaiian families tending ancient fish traps, wading waist-deep in coves separated by stakes from the wider ocean.
From the central hills of Molokai, looking across the placid water, the lavender slopes of neighbor islands Lanai and Maui taper to the horizon like the backs of enormous sleeping whales. From the hills the road drops into Kaunakakai, Molokai's easygoing main town with mock Western shop fronts and no stoplights.
Forever marked by its tragic past as a leper colony, this little-visited and perhaps most Hawaiian of the main Hawaiian islands makes a deep impression on its smattering of visitors.
Its appeal lies in its rugged beauty, its rural charm -- and the inescapable and stirring memory of Father Damien, a Belgian priest who arrived in 1873 to ease the hellish lives of lepers. (Leprosy is a progressive disease that causes deformities and loss of sensation to the extremities of those infected. It is apparently acquired only after long and close contact by the small percentage of the population who are genetically disposed.)
If Oahu and Maui are the Tourist Islands, Kauai the Garden Island, and Hawaii the Big Island, now-peaceful Molokai is the Spiritual Island.
Preserving Father Damien's memory is the mission of a blunt, crotchety, third-generation leper named Richard Marks, who serves as tour guide, former sheriff, toastmaster, importer and local gadfly.
Via a jouncing school bus, Mr. Marks, whose disease is largely controlled by drugs and thus is not contagious, gives tours of the leper colony on Kalaupapa. The flat colony on Molokai's north-central peninsula at the base of 1,600-foot sea cliffs -- the world's highest -- is cut off from the topside, or rugged main landmass, of Molokai.
Kalaupapa is the main attraction for many of Molokai's 100,000 annual visitors, a tiny proportion of Hawaii's 7 million yearly tourists. Modern-day pilgrims must clamber down the cliffs on foot or by mule, or fly in to Kalaupapa from Honolulu or Molokai's airport. The cliffs make driving to the peninsula impossible.
A hiker by nature, I decided to tromp down the nearly vertical cliff face to the leper colony. The sheer, wind-swept trail zigzags 2 1/2 miles down 26 switchbacks, affording views of cliffs marching west along the ocean. Below and to the right spreads the aptly named Kalaupapa ("flat leaf" in Hawaiian) peninsula, bounded by rough Pacific waters.
My walk dispelled an impression that all of Molokai was a leper colony, a misconception dating to reading long ago a children's book about Father Damien. Now I could see the peninsula was only perhaps a square mile of the larger, roughly brick-shaped island, 38 miles east to west by 10 miles north to south.
A group of hikers waited in a meadow at the cliff base for Richard Marks to finish fueling a school bus. The Spiritual Island had drawn a different tour-group mix from that found along the boulevards of Waikiki: two Methodist ministers, two occupational therapists and six Korean Christians from a Honolulu church.
A stocky 6-footer with pocked skin, graying hair and large ears, Mr. Marks, 62, loaded us onto the school bus. He waved to a 70-ish Chinese leper, one of about 90 still left on Kalaupapa, who drove past in an aging sedan. Though the man's face had a hollow featureless look, his nose worn and his mouth an open "O," he was clearly grinning, the picture of innocent merriment as he hurtled at his top speed, about 10 mph, around Kalaupapa's rutted roads.
The school bus jounced over to the east side of the peninsula, known as Kalawao. There the forest-green sea cliffs of Molokai meet an ocean filled with small upthrust islands the shape of shark's teeth.
Kalawao's classic South Seas beauty is made terrible by the knowledge that here boatmen from Honolulu shoved lepers into these treacherous waters. Those who made it to shore lived as animals, lawless and without shelter for the remainder of their brief lives -- until Father Damien arrived.
A combination of nurse and no-frills carpenter, Father Damien built homes and churches and moved the lepers to the drier west edge of Kalaupapa, where their successors still live today. In 1889, 16 years after he arrived, he finally died of leprosy himself -- the only priest assigned to the colony to so succumb. Hawaii hopes that he will eventually be declared a saint, a move apparently delayed by Father Damien's habit of quarreling obstinately with church and government bureaucrats to gain lumber and medicine for the lepers.
Richard Marks told the priest's story sitting at the edge of the altar in St. Philomena's, a wooden church with simple strong lines built by Father Damien beside the glorious Pacific. Mr. Marks scratched his leg. "Sometimes it burns so much, my leg feels like it has a fever of 105 degrees," said the leper.
"Lepers have to spit a lot, so they would come to Mass but stand outside, looking in the church windows. Father Damien cut holes" -- Mr. Marks gestured to neat squares in the sienna-painted floor -- "so the lepers could come inside to attend Mass and still spit."
Mr. Marks spoke quietly. His listeners edged closer to the altar to catch his words about Father Damien sawing and hammering, (( tirelessly constructing churches and shelters, disregarding the unpleasant sight and smell of leprous sores in the era before sulfone drugs.
Mr. Marks described his own life -- growing up on Maui as one family member after another was exiled to Molokai. At 15 he ran away to the merchant marine, visiting Australia and Hong Kong. He was captured on a sneak visit to Kalaupapa to see his father but escaped up the cliffs. He eventually returned voluntarily as his leprosy symptoms began to worsen.
He has met Pope John Paul II, and today he gives talks to AIDS victims shunned by society -- what he termed the lepers of the 1990s.
A visit to Kalaupapa is the highlight of most visits to Molokai and can be accomplished in a day trip from Honolulu or Maui. Topside are natural, low-key attractions worth several more days of exploring: a macadamia nut farm, a wildlife ranch and the striking beach at Papohaku. (Camping is permitted at the breezy, peaceful site.)
A popular hike at Molokai's eastern tip is to the Moaula Falls. If you have a mental picture of Eden, it will probably be surpassed by the first vision of the falls, after rounding the last turn on the King Kamehameha V Highway. The waterfall spumes down the deep V of gardenlike Halawa Valley, with air perfumed by eucalyptus. The shoreline is dotted with tents, the only remaining habitation of an area devastated by the double-punch of tsunamis -- tidal waves -- in 1946 and 1957.
The valley is past the eastern terminus of the main highway, which clambers through eroded volcanic soils, narrowing to only one lane wide in places. Sound the horn! A combination Grand Prix event and mini-Pacific Coast Highway, the eastern end of the Molokai highway affords a distant, twinkling view of the high-rise hotels on Maui's Kaanapali coast, nine miles distant.
With luck the local radio station will have a traditional Hawaiian music hour at sunset, with the Cazimero Brothers' achingly sweet harmonies providing a fitting soundtrack to the waterside drive.
For those seeking to explore Hawaii as it was, the lovely interisland channel seems to look better on the serene Molokai side looking at Maui, instead of the other way around.
If you go . . .
Molokai gets only 1.5 percent of Hawaii's tourists, and it seems that its accommodations, restaurants, air flights and rental cars are less in supply than on the more tourist-oriented islands with their extensive amenities. Flights from Oahu book up swiftly on weekends, so don't count on "winging it" as readily as is possible for spur-of-the-moment trips to Maui, Kauai or the Big Island. Try to call the airlines a week before you plan to visit Molokai.
Flights: Aloha Airlines, (800) 367-5250, offers service via its commuter arm, Aloha Island Air, from Honolulu to Molokai on 18-seater turboprop airplanes 14 times a day. One way fare is $65.95, round trip $131.90. Childrens' rates are available. A coupon booklet is the best value, with six transferable, fully refundable tickets around the main Hawaiian islands for $305.58.
Hawaiian Airlines, (800) 367-5320, flies five flights a day, $65.95 one way, or $324 for six coupons.
Friendly Isle Travel, (808) 533-1368, Old Stadium Square, 2320 S. King St., second floor, offers coupon books with six tickets costing $252 on Hawaiian, $257 on Aloha. Coupon books with an expiration date of about three months from purchase are about $250. Single one-way tickets are $44 on Aloha, $45 on Hawaiian.
Various commuter airline companies come and go, often with cheaper fares than Aloha and Hawaiian. To check on these airlines -- a fluid proposition -- read the ads in the local papers in Honolulu.
Accommodation: Colony's Kaluakoi Hotel & Golf Club, (800) 777-1700, the only large hotel on Molokai, is convenient to isolated Papohaku beach and some of Hawaii's most deserted swimming coves. It offers condos with cooking facilities.
There is also a smattering of other small condominiums and a handful of bed and breakfast places and campgrounds. Highly recommended with advance reservations is a bed and breakfast called Honomuni House, (808) 558-8383, 17 miles east of Kaunakakai.
Jan Newhouse and his wife, Keaho, proprietors, rent a cottage adjacent to their house. Jan is a historian and hiker who grew up in Kauai, and Keaho, who is from a native Molokai family, teaches on Oahu during the week, returning to her Molokai home on weekends. The couple is knowledgeable about both Tahiti and Hawaii and owns an extensive library on the island.
Food: A visit to the Mid Nite Inn on the main street of Kaunakakai (a town of rustic shop fronts, looking like a movie set for a spaghetti Western) is a must. Delicious grilled mahi mahi goes for about $7. Lots of local families eat here. Despite the name, it closes around 9 p.m. You can also get food at grocery stores in Kaunakakai for picnics.
Information: Call Hawaii tourism, (808) 586-2406, for general information. Destination Molokai, (800) 367-4753, sends out a brochure with information on Molokai.
Recommended books: "Hawaii: A Travel Survival Kit" (Lonely Planet, $15.95) and "Hidden Hawaii" by Ray Reigert (Publishers Group West, $13.95).
Activities: To visit the Kalaupapa peninsula, it is mandatory to book through Damien Tours, (808) 567-6171). Cost is about $18.
Visitors can fly in or come down the sea cliffs on foot or muleback. Molokai Mule Ride is bookable through Rare Adventures, (800) 843-5978, or on Molokai, (808) 567-6088. It charges $119.60, which includes the mule ride to Kalaupapa, a ground tour and lunch. Participants must be more than 16 years old and weigh less than 225 pounds.
Visitors can also explore hiking trails, waterfalls, a wildlife ranch and a macadamia nut farm. Sailboats can be chartered for
snorkeling on the neighboring island of Lanai. Details can be found in the travel books recommended above.