A walk through Waikiki
Waikiki’s public face is an oceanfront procession of tourist hotels and shops, said Guy Trebay in Travel + Leisure. Hidden behind is an older, funkier Waikiki, though one that’s fast disappearing. Today there are fewer hole-in-the-wall joints selling shaved ice flavored with coconut syrup, and the Waikiki Beach Walk project has transformed “eight acres of dive bars and budget hotels” into something that vaguely looks like Denver, only with “better beach access.” A series of crossed tiki torches light the way through “landscaped islands of fan palms” interspersed with new retail stores and restaurants. Yet the Walk does evoke the glamour of the resort’s “bygone days” and leads to the “justifiably fabled” Halekulani Hotel, where the deep calm of cool, open lobbies and gardens is broken only by the sound of the surf and the beachside restaurant. What could be more pleasant than sitting at the open-air bar and becoming “pleasantly looped on the stealthy mai tais”?
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