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Limiting commercial tours to Haleakala

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  • Limiting commercial tours to Haleakala

    The National Park Service is implementing an interim plan that will put a temporary moratorium on issuing additional permits to commercial operations who want to take tourists up to the Haleakala summit to witness the sunrise.
    This will allow more locals and individuals in private cars to use the parking lots.

    Even though all the tourist guides suggest that seeing sunrise atop Haleakala is a must for every tourist, the National Park Service says sunset is just as spectacular, and the parking lot is virtually deserted at that time.

    I've travelled a few times up to the summit to see the sunrise, but it's become a zoo now to have to compete with huge tour buses and those idiotic bike-down-the mountain concessions who put both their patrons and other drivers in peril. When I was a small kid, you could go up there and maybe have to share the awesome spectacle with 20 or so people. Now it's elbow to shoulder people. And after about a half hour, they all head back down the mountain, without taking advantage of the displays and exhibits that explain both the Hawaiian legend of Maui as well as the geological foundations for the island of Maui. Sad.

    Miulang
    "Americans believe in three freedoms. Freedom of speech; freedom of religion; and the freedom to deny the other two to folks they don`t like.” --Mark Twain

  • #2
    Re: Limiting commercial tours to Haleakala

    You know Miulang one of the problems with seeing the sunrise at Haleakala is simply that most car rental agencies prohibit you from taking a rental up to the summit for fear that you will ride the brakes on the way down, damaging the car or possibly getting into an accident.

    So with that said, how does one get to see this magnificant view? You gotta take a tour bus. And that's where the problem is, this simultaneous unloading of hundreds of people at the lookout. All it takes is around three Roberts Hawaii tour busses to jam the observatory with hundreds of eager sun worshippers.

    Really what they need to do is to restrict the number of downhill bicycling tours that clog the roadway down the volcano. I mean Haleakala isn't a thrill ride, it's a volcano with a very narrow and challenging 30-mile road. It's no place for a novice bicyclist.
    Life is what you make of it...so please read the instructions carefully.

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    • #3
      Re: Limiting commercial tours to Haleakala

      >>>one of the problems with seeing the sunrise at Haleakala is simply that most car rental agencies prohibit you from taking a rental up to the summit for fear that you will ride the brakes on the way down, damaging the car or possibly getting into an accident.
      <<<

      Not familiar with that clause. There are, however, warnings from the companies to use a "lower gear" when coming down. I grew up near the junction of Crater Road and Haleakala Hwy, and the smell of smoking brakes wafted through the air daily. Heck, it still does. And more than once we've had people wreck at the bottom of our driveway after they lost their brakes. "I didn't think it was that steep," they'd say.

      >>>Really what they need to do is to restrict the number of downhill bicycling tours that clog the roadway down the volcano. I mean Haleakala isn't a thrill ride, it's a volcano with a very narrow and challenging 30-mile road. It's no place for a novice bicyclist.
      <<<

      These bike groups are a menace. I go back home all the time, and it's no fun getting stuck behind them on the way down into town. Of course, they wreck out all the time, too. You get clowns who haven't been on a bike for 40 years and think they can all of a sudden ride down Haleakala.

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      • #4
        Re: Limiting commercial tours to Haleakala

        It`s about time the Parks Services Started putting limits on tours going to
        Haleakala. I usually take family members to the crater for sunrise when they
        come ffom the Mainland with a warning. We must leave Kahului early if we want to get a good parking and a section of our own, or else forget it. I also let them know we must head down before we get stuck behind one of those bike tours or tour buses. I went up this past March and talk about bike tour vans all over the crater. Was one joke, I no could get over how much bike tours go up there. Before you only had a couple of compnies, now choke...
        bin dea-dunn dat.

        Comment


        • #5
          Re: Limiting commercial tours to Haleakala

          Originally posted by dick
          I grew up near the junction of Crater Road and Haleakala Hwy, and the smell of smoking brakes wafted through the air daily. Heck, it still does. And more than once we've had people wreck at the bottom of our driveway after they lost their brakes. "I didn't think it was that steep," they'd say.
          I lived about 20 feet from that junction too part of when I was growing up. The smell and noise was really annoying. The bikers were the worst though. You'd hear them yelling and going by so early in the morning sometimes. And god help you if you left your house to go down country and got stuck behind them... I learned how to drive swearing at them. Baby's first road rage.
          Haolewaiian Girl
          >~~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~~<

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          • #6
            Re: Limiting commercial tours to Haleakala

            Meh, I see Haleakala out the window every morning. It don't look that exciting. See the attached picture I took of it yesterday morning. (Kohala in the foreground)
            Attached Files
            Last edited by beaker; November 14, 2005, 06:45 AM.

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            • #7
              Re: Limiting commercial tours to Haleakala

              Something up there shines back at us when the Sun hits it just right. I guess there are a bunch of tourists over there looking back at me, huh? (blow up the picture to see the reflection at the summit)
              Attached Files

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              • #8
                Re: Limiting commercial tours to Haleakala

                No, it's the dome of the observatory that's up at the top of Haleakala. There is a Science City up there a few miles past the tourist center. That, mercifully, is the only government installation (i.e. Federal govt owned) on the island of Maui. They use the telecopes up there to track the space missions, just like on Mauna Kea and Koke'e.

                Miulang
                "Americans believe in three freedoms. Freedom of speech; freedom of religion; and the freedom to deny the other two to folks they don`t like.” --Mark Twain

                Comment


                • #9
                  Re: Limiting commercial tours to Haleakala

                  Originally posted by Miulang
                  No, it's the dome of the observatory that's up at the top of Haleakala. There is a Science City up there a few miles past the tourist center. That, mercifully, is the only government installation (i.e. Federal govt owned) on the island of Maui. They use the telecopes up there to track the space missions, just like on Mauna Kea and Koke'e.

                  Miulang

                  They also track asteroids so if one is to destroy us we'd have at least the heads up on that one.

                  Oh man I wish God would get it over with and press the button on Rapture already. This world is really going to the dogs. A major reset in civilizaton is greatly need about now.

                  Oh how I miss the good old days...twenty-five cents for a gallon of gas!
                  Life is what you make of it...so please read the instructions carefully.

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Re: Limiting commercial tours to Haleakala

                    Originally posted by craigwatanabe
                    You know Miulang one of the problems with seeing the sunrise at Haleakala is simply that most car rental agencies prohibit you from taking a rental up to the summit for fear that you will ride the brakes on the way down, damaging the car or possibly getting into an accident.
                    I've taken rental cars up to Haleakala and not had a problem. Of course, I also know to shift into first gear and not sit on the brakes, either.

                    Miulang
                    "Americans believe in three freedoms. Freedom of speech; freedom of religion; and the freedom to deny the other two to folks they don`t like.” --Mark Twain

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      Re: Limiting commercial tours to Haleakala

                      Originally posted by Miulang
                      I've taken rental cars up to Haleakala and not had a problem. Of course, I also know to shift into first gear and not sit on the brakes, either.

                      Miulang
                      You see Miulang there in lies your problem. You push down on the brake pedal with your foot...not sit on it with your Okole
                      Life is what you make of it...so please read the instructions carefully.

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                      • #12
                        Re: Limiting commercial tours to Haleakala

                        Originally posted by craigwatanabe
                        Oh man I wish God would get it over with and press the button on Rapture already. A major reset in civilizaton is greatly need about now.
                        Ummm...if I understand it right, we're not talking "reset" so much as "game over."

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                        • #13
                          Re: Limiting commercial tours to Haleakala

                          It's game over if you're a non-believer. It's a reset if you're faithful in God.

                          Rapture is that backstage pass when the concert's over. For the rest well it's you, the parking lot, drunk fans and one exit out with the cops waiting with their sobriety check point right outside.

                          I'll take the backstage pass.
                          Life is what you make of it...so please read the instructions carefully.

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            Re: Limiting commercial tours to Haleakala

                            Originally posted by craigwatanabe
                            [...]Oh how I miss the good old days...twenty-five cents for a gallon of gas!
                            Naht! Really?! IIRC, you're nowhere near my age and I remember pulling into a gas station and buying 4 gallons of gas with my $1. weekly allowance...1960! Regardless...25 cents/gallon...yep, those were the good ol' days. I love telling the very young station attendants at Lex Brodie's that story...every, single time I fill up! What used to cost $3.50 now costs $40.!

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                            • #15
                              Re: Limiting commercial tours to Haleakala

                              Originally posted by craigwatanabe
                              Rapture is that backstage pass when the concert's over. For the rest well it's you, the parking lot, drunk fans and one exit out with the cops waiting with their sobriety check point right outside.
                              CW - you and I won't see eye-to-eye on discussions of a religious nature, but I hope you are as okay with that as I am.

                              That said, I must tell you that I really liked your analogy!

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