Has anyone stayed at the Hale-Kai condos? Any comments? We will be in Maui for 4 days.
Is the Road to Hana worth it to spend a whole day of our 4? Also, what about sunrise on Haleakala? Is that worth the early morning trip from West Maui?

Hello Marsha,
If you're going to drive to Hana and up that volcano I don't know if it's worth. There are many curves and twists. When I went on my honeymoon we hired a great tour company that drove us and one other couple. Hana was beautiful but of course it was expensive. The volcano is easier to drive up. The view was spectacular. However, if you're from the West Coast you've probably seen a nice sunrise before.

Drive half-way to Hana. It pretty much looks the same and it's tiring from there on to Hana. There is not that much to see in Hana itself.I have not done the sunrise thing but the trip up the mountain is cool.

We will be in Maui for 5 days in April and have decided to definitely do the Road to Hana. According to a book called Maui Revealed there are dozens of waterfalls and other beautiful spots along the way. Jury is still out on the pre-dawn volcano sunrise/bike ride. I don't like being cold and they advise to dress very warmly for the sunrise. Is this a "must do" or not?

The sunrise is very beautiful, but we did it on our second trip to Maui, and were we missed it the time around. The pickup is very early, like 3 or 4am. It is very COLD, like 30's. Some tours offer coats, and we saw some people with their hotel blankets with them. If you do it, go the first morning you are there, or you won't want to get up later in the week.
The Road to Hana is very nice, but we only went halfway. We stopped at Pa'ia and got picnic lunches (there is nowhere else to stop), and had breakfast on the beach at Ho'okipa while we watched the windsurfers. The road can get very crowded. We could not always pull over where we wanted because there were too many cars already parked there. We did see a few waterfalls. We even hiked over top of one waterfall to a pool & there was another waterfall. We went swimming (alone), had lunch, and drove back. It was a very wonderful day.
We love snorkeling too. We rented some gear, got a map & took off all over the island. It was a lot of fun. We also took the Molikini snorkel tour. It was great. They serve breakfast on the way out, and lunch on the way back in.
Have a great time!

Sorry about the last message, we were sorry we missed the sunrise the first time we were there. It is a truly unique experience.

Marsha,

I would *highly* recommend getting up and experiencing the sunrise at the top of Haleakala. It was absolutely breathtaking. I also suggest hiking a ways down into the volcano. It gets better the further you go down. Its a rough walk back up though, with the high altitude! It is cold, but not horribly so. We just wore jeans and jackets and brought hotel blankets and we were fine.

We loved the Road to Hana as well, and recommend going PAST Hana to the "7 Sacred Pools" (or so named - there are tons of pools here). We took the upper trail (a 2 mile hike) and experienced a 400 ft tall waterfall at the top (after AMAZING scenery, including a dense bamboo forest, on the way up). Absolutely beautiful.

If you don't want to do Hana, we suggest starting in Kapalua and driving around the top of the "head" of Maui. It will most likely say that you cannot drive this road in your car rental agreement, but ignore it. It is the MOST amazing scenery on Maui, even though the road is 1 lane and VERY narrow. You will be blown away by the scenery.