AFTER MANY YEARS LEADING GROUPS to the Honolulu
Marathon with Roadrunner Tours, I developed an itinerary
that blended running and sightseeing and offered the
best opportunity to enjoy the Hawaiian Islands. Catering
to the needs of runners, Roadrunner Tours offered One-Island,
Two-Island and Three-Island tours.
There's no question in my mind that Three-Island is the
way to go--if you have the time and can afford the extra
expense. One reason to consider an extended stay is that it
takes most travelers who live on the Mainland a full day
coming and going to travel to the Hawaiian Islands. Since a
large part of the expense is the cost of air travel, you
might as well take the time and spend the extra
money--particularly if this is your one-time visit.
Following is the itinerary that I developed during
my ten visits to Hawaii for the Honolulu Marathon.
My Do-It-Yourself Tour begins on the Big Island of
Hawaii, then continues to Oahu for the Marathon. After
the race, I always enjoyed several days of Rest &
Relaxation on Maui, and on two other separate occasions
my wife Rose and I stayed several days longer to see
Kauai and Molokai.
You can decide whether you want to visit one, two,
three or more of the Hawaiian Islands, but here is
the itinerary I recommend for a Do-It-Yourself Tour
of the Honolulu Marathon, beginning the Monday before
the race.
Monday: Depart from home. (Air fare usually
costs less if you avoid weekend travel.) I live in
Northwestern Indiana. It takes four hours from Chicago
to reach the West Coast and another four hours of
air time over the Pacific to reach the Hawaiian Islands,
a total of eight hours for Chicagoans. It may take
you more or less depending on where you live. (For
more information, see Airlines.)
After landing in Honolulu, it's a short walk (or ride
by shuttle bus) to the Inter-Island terminal for a
continuing flight to Kona on the Big Island of Hawaii.
You'll be tired from your long day of travel (and
probably overfed on airline food), so I don't recommend
running, or at least not a hard workout. Instead,
take a walk along the ocean front, and go to bed early.
Early to bed and early to rise is a good strategy
for the week before the marathon, and here's why.
The Honolulu Marathon starts at 5:00 AM, but with
the four-hour time difference, that's 9:00 AM for
those of us who live in the Central Time Zone. If
you try to maintain your back-home sleep patterns
as much as possible, you'll find it a lot easier to
get up on marathon day. An excellent location for
runners on the Big Island is King Kamehameha's Kona
Beach Hotel, next to the beach at Kailua-Kona, site
of the swimming leg of the Ironman Triathlon. (For
more information, see Hotels.)
Tuesday: The main reason to come to the Big
Island is to visit Volcanoes National Park. Hawaii
is the easternmost of the Hawaiian Islands and the
only one that contains still-active volcanoes. Lava
flows present fascinating landscapes. Most visitors
sign up for a tour by sightseeing bus, but consider
doing your own self-guided tour by rental car, which
will allow you to run through Kilauea Iki crater.
(Rental cars often cost less if you reserve them in
advance in connection with your air and hotels, one
reason why you may want to book through a travel agent.)
I can show you a course that winds a half dozen miles
over lava rock through a lava tube and past steaming
fissures. Accomplishing this takes some planning,
but this is the first of the three Volcano
Runs on Hawaii, Oahu and Maui. While touring the
island, be sure to visit the Black Sand Beach for
a dip in the surf.
Wednesday: Plan an early morning run at sunrise
along the ocean shore. From your hotel in downtown
Kona, the best route is to run south along the ocean:
out-and-back, dialing in whatever distance you want.
(For information on how to train for the Honolulu
Marathon, see
Training.) Have a leisurely breakfast and stroll
through town before departing mid-day for Oahu. Landing
again at the Honolulu Airport, you can take a limousine
or taxi into town--or even a city bus. There are many
excellent Hotels all along Kalakaua Boulevard fronting
Waikiki Beach. One of my past favorites was the Hawaiian
Regent, because it's only a few blocks from Kapiolani
Park and the finish line. The Outrigger Reef on the
Beach is the official headquarters hotel for the Honolulu
Marathon, meaning you can book a discount room (if
you act quickly).Regardless of your budget and where
you want to stay, with more than 20,000 runners expected
for the race, it's a good idea to make your reservations
now. The Expo opens today. You can pick up your number
any time four days before the race. (For information
on entering the race, see Honolulu Marathon.)
Thursday: A favorite run for those living
in Honolulu starts at Kapiolani Park and goes to the
top of Mount Tantalus and back, a distance of about
18 miles. That's usually harder than I want to run
three days before the marathon, so despite nine visits
to Honolulu I still haven't run on Mount Tantalus,
but you can read about it on Guided
Workouts. Leave plenty of time for sightseeing.
The one attraction you do not want to miss
while visiting Honolulu is Pearl Harbor! You can sign
up for a tour, or simply take a city bus, which allows
you to stay as long as you want. Also worth your time
on this or another day is a circle-island tour. Snorkel
or sail, depending on how serious you are about your
race. A luau on the beach is fun, here or on Maui.
Friday: The most popular run for local runners
is a 5-mile loop around Diamond Head, beginning and
ending at Kapiolani Park, covering a portion of the
marathon course. Many runners who visit the Hawaiian
Islands do this run without realizing that if they
turn left on the backside, they can run through a
tunnel into the crater and climb a series of stairs
for a stunning view of Waikiki beach. This is the
second of our three Volcano
Runs. The distance, including the climb, is 8.4
miles. Again, this is more running than I usually
do two days before a marathon, but how often do you
get a chance to run in Paradise? The Honolulu Marathon
Association sponsors its pasta party tonight. Like
most pasta parties, it's crowded and crazy, but part
of the marathon experience.
Saturday: For those who don't want to take
the day off before the marathon, consider a pleasant
run of 4 or 6 miles along the Ala Moana Canal into
Ala Moana Park. If you time it right, you can watch
the sun come up around 7:00 A.M. This will also give
you a chance to check out the starting line nearby
and plan for tomorrow.
Sunday: Buses depart early for the starting
line opposite the Ala Moana Shopping Center--or you
may want to walk/jog to the line. The marathon is
why you came. You'll start in the dark with fireworks
lighting the sky, a moving experience. Despite more
than 20,000 starters, the staging area is wide with
port-a-potties on a grassy bern between two lanes
of traffic. After the race, there's a neat awards
party in Kapiolani Park. For more details on the race,
see: Honolulu Marathon.
Monday: To loosen our legs, we usually walk
from our hotel along the beach to the Royal Hawaiian
Hotel for brunch. Painted a bright pink, the Royal
Hawaiian was one of the earliest hotels erected on
Waikiki Beach, and it remains as elegant today as
it was yesterday. The airports will be full today
with marathoners heading home, usually catching one
of the late (red-eye) flights that land the next morning.
Your schedule may require a quick return, but we recommend
continuing on to Maui. We usually stay at Kaanapali
Beach on Maui's northwestern shore, several miles
up the road from the town of Lahaina. One of our favorite
hotels
is the Sheraton Maui. Whether you stay there
or not, be sure to visit at sundown to watch the traditional
torch-lighting ceremony, where an Islander runs with
a torch to the tip of Black Rock, hurls the torch
into the waves below, then dives after it. (If you
don't do well in the marathon, you may want to follow
him into the water.)
Tuesday: I don't pretend to understand the
language, but I've always figured Maui was Hawaiian
for Rest & Relaxation. Kaanapali has the best
white sand beach on the outer island, as well as an
attractive shopping center (The Whaler's Village)
with several excellent restaurants, but we like its
proximity to Lahaina, which can be reached by bus
or the Sugar Cane Train. (For more on history, read
James Michener's Hawaii.) The Royal Kaanapali
Golf Course winds up through the hills. Supposedly,
joggers are prohibited from running on the course,
but if you rise early enough, you may be able to beat
the golfers and jog to the top for an overlook of
Molokai on the other side of the island. (The islands
of Lanai and Kahoolawe are visible from the beach,
and if you drive to Hana on the far end of the island,
you can get a view of the Big Island.) This evening
or the next, you might want to consider a beach luau
at the Sheraton Maui, or the Polynesian Review
at the Hyatt Regency Maui.
Wednesday: This is the day we usually did
our third and final Volcano Run through Haleakala
Crater. It requires rising at 3:30 AM, renting a car
so you can arrive at Haleakala (10,023 feet) for sunrise,
then descending into the crater to 6,000 feet and
hiking out on the other side at 8,000 feet. (Unlike
Kilauea Iki on the Big Island, Haleakala is a dormant
volcano.) Doing this run takes some logistical planning,
since the entrance to the crater is several miles
by highway above the exit. When you have a large enough
group, you can solve this problem by dropping one
car in the lower parking lot. Otherwise, you need
someone willing to not run and pick you up at the
end. (See
Volcano Runs for more details.) It may sound crazy
to do an 11.6-mile run through a crater at high altitude
only three days after running a marathon, but this
is an Ultimate Running Experience. Trust me on this
one!
Thursday: This is a good day to jog the several
miles into Lahaina for breakfast at Longhi's, an open-air
restaurant and one of our favorites. You can do some
last-minute shopping before catching the bus or train
back to your hotel. This is the end of your Do-It-Yourself
Tour of the Honolulu Marathon, but consider spending
more time before or after to see Molokai and/or Kauai.
You can fly out of Maui early afternoon and connect
in Honolulu with a red-eye flight that will get you
back to the mainland Friday morning. Don't forget
to say "Aloha" as you depart and don't bring any volcano
rock home with you. Doing so will result in a curse
being placed upon your head by the Goddess Pele, which
will make it impossible for you to return to the Hawaiian
Islands. I've never made this mistake, which is one
reason why I've run the Honolulu Marathon ten times.
