Mauna Kea - is booking a tour operator necessary?
 

Hi all,

I'm heading to the BI in January. I understand that accessing the summit of Mauna Kea from the visitor centre is not permitted by cars without 4x4. Therefore the only options would be to a) take a tour or b) hike. It's only 4,000 feet which even at altitude (I live in Calgary - Canada's Denver) isn't too tough a hike by my standards.

Is it permitted or common to hike to the summit? Must a visitor otherwise take a tour outfit?

My hesitation is that the few tour operators I've seen so far run a 7-8 hour trip that is pretty pricey, includes travel from my resort, dinner, etc. and frankly I don't want the full-meal-deal as I am renting a car and would be happier to go up on my own time.

Are there other tour operators that take less time? Are there operations that run from the visitor centre?

thanks in advance!

ttt

Can you go to the summit at all in January? It will be covered in snow. In the summer, you CAN drive up in a normal 2WD rental car, but I would think that the 5 mile dirt part of the road would not be drivable in winter.

generally not recommended to hike in january but it’s possible to get up there if you want to ski.

can anyone recommend a good tour outfit to take us to the top?

It's interesting that even at altitude there are snowy times of year - 'seasons' - in Hawaii given it is only 19 degrees north of the equator. Didn't think about that!

We took a tour in April - because I understood you weren't allowed to take a rental car to the Visitor's Centre......you might want to check that out

DH and I have done two trips to Mauna Kea. The first with a tour that took us to the top. Even in July we needed hooded parkas supplied by the tour. We then went down to about 7000 ft for sky watching.

The second time we had the kids with us. Tours will not take kids under 16 [I think]. We drove our rental car to the visitors center before sunset, then stayed for stargazing. From the visitors center you do not have a sunset view but the stars are magnificient. We had jackets, jeans, hats and gloves and again this was in July.

We thoroughly enjoyed our trip with Mauna Kea Summit Adventures. Check out their website.

thank you! Suzie, great answers. Exactly what I was looking for.

Appreciated, everyone.