The Best of West Maui & the Road to Hana

In all of the places I’ve traveled, my trip to West Maui will always rank as one of my favorites because of how much beauty & adventure there is to experience around every corner. From the pristine beaches to the stunning moss-covered cliffs, you can quite literally go from hiking a mountain to surfing within an hour. We visited in early March which provided us with beautiful sunny weather and the chance to see whales in their natural habitat (something I’ll never forget).

With only 5 full days on the island, our focus was to try and see as much of the island as possible and experience a nice blend of adventure & relaxation. When I travel, I like to plan a few things ahead of time (especially restaurants like Mama’s Fish House that book up months in advance) while leaving room for exploration and last-minute plans.

Of course, it’s impossible to see everything in less than a week, so I can’t wait to get back to West Maui to revisit some of my favorite places from my first trip and experience some new things as well. For example, we never made it out to Haleakala National Park, which is highly recommended! If you’ve been to Maui, write your favorite things in the comments so I can add them to my list for my next trip.

6 Day Itinerary – The Best of West Maui & the Road to Hana

Before we dive into the full agenda for each day, here’s a quick look at how we scheduled this trip to take advantage of our time & money while on the island. We were celebrating a birthday on this trip, so we did splurge a little more than usual on certain excursions and meals.

Day 1 – Flight Into Maui & Tin Roof Restaurant
Day 2 – Reppel Maui & the Road to Hana
Day 3 – Surfing Lesson in Lahaina & Beach in Ka’anapali
Day 4 – Whale Watching Tour & Mama’s Fish House
Day 5 – Brunch & Massages at The Westin; Old Lahaina Luau
Day 6 – Morning Yoga & Relaxing Final Day at Kapalua Beach

Day 1 – Flight into Maui & Tin Roof Restaurant

Taking advantage of a Southwest flight promotion ($268 roundtrip!), we flew from Denver to San Jose before continuing on to Maui. We landed on Maui at 4 pm HST and picked up our rental car from Hertz.

*Poke Bowl from Tin Roof Restaurant. Six minutes from the airport!*

Side note – I highly recommend having a rental car on Maui. It’s a small island, but if you have six days to explore you’ll want to see a lot of it, and that is easiest with a rental. The Road to Hana alone would be impossible without a rental, unless you opt for a group tour, but I prefer to have control over where I stop and when, especially when it comes to finding local restaurants, beaches, and places that are off the beaten path. We paid $485 for the week.

While we were waiting for our rental, I placed an online order with Tin Roof restaurant. If you haven’t heard of it, it is the BEST place to grab a bite after landing on Maui (or before leaving). Not only is it owned by Top Chef alum Sheldon Simeon, which means seriously delicious dishes, the restaurant is located just six minutes from the airport. There’s a few seats outdoors and it’s perfectly normal to see people sitting on the ground with their bowl of garlic noodles and chopsticks right on the sideway outside (which is what we did, and it was amazing). You can also grab your food and eat it at the nearest beach or park (my suggestion would be Kanaha Beach Park, 5 minutes from Tin Roof).

After dinner, we drove to our VRBO rental at Hale Ono Loa in Lahaina. This was a quiet spot in West Maui with a gorgeous balcony view of the ocean that provided epic sunset views. Unfortunately our exact unit is now no longer on VRBO, but Hale Ono Loa has several other units available.

Day 2 – Reppel Maui & the Road to Hana

I doubt you’ll come across a blog post on Maui that doesn’t mention the Road to Hana. But if you love a little bit of adventure mixed in when you travel like I do, I can’t recommend the Classic Rappelling Tour with Rappel Maui enough. We picked the 8 am start time, taking advantage of the time change to easily wake up early and get on the road, stopping for breakfast at a little roadside stand called Pe’ahi Farm Stand and Cafe where I had a delicious avocado toast and smoothie.

The Rappel Maui group meets at the Garden of Eden Arboretum, located on the Hana Highway in Haiku. Our small group of about 10 all strapped on our gear and hiked a short distance into the rainforest that was used in the opening shot of Jurassic Park! We started with a short repel down a dry wall to practice with the equipment and then moved on to repel down two beautiful waterfalls (one 50-feet and the other 30-feet) into large, natural pools. It was an exhilarating experience in one of the most beautiful locations and the guides were extremely knowledgeable and personable. The tour lasted about 3 hours and was a perfect kick-off to our day on the Road to Hana.

Reppel Maui
Reppeling down the water fall!
Aunt Sandy’s Banana Bread
Huli Huli Chicken
Black Sand Beach!

After the tour, we made a stop at Aunt Sandy’s Banana Bread which is a popular tourist spot, but for good reason. We bought three loaves so we could enjoy it throughout our time on Maui and honestly, I wish we would have bought more! We then stopped for lunch at Huli Huli Chicken at Koki Beach Park ($18/combo plate). Huli Huli chicken is a grilled chicken dish in Hawaiian cuisine, prepared by barbecuing a chicken over mesquite wood, and basting it with a sweet huli-huli sauce, and it was on my list of things to try while on Maui. This location did not disappoint and felt like a perfect picnic lunch with ocean views after a busy morning of exploring!

After lunch, we followed along the Road to Hana until we got to our final destination, Waiʻānapanapa State Park to visit the black sand beach. Note: this state park does require reservations, so be sure to plan in advance if possible ($15 for parking & entry). We reserved our spot just a few hours in advance, but I have heard during the busy season these slots can sell out. If you’re venturing onto the Road to Hana, I would highly recommend stopping here for a few hours! Though it was a little crowded, we enjoyed seeing the black sand beach and swimming for a little while in the gorgeous water.

As a side note, many people will decide to spend a night or two in Hana to explore the east side of the island, and while we decided to do the Road to Hana as a day trip, I would recommend looking into staying the night if that is an option for you! Because we had a home base in our condo, we decided not to stay the night, but I would’ve enjoyed spending more time on that side of the island if we had more time!

Finally (after a long day!) we made it back to Lahaina and enjoyed a quick takeout dinner from The Fish Market Maui of a local catch fish with the hawaiian sides of mac & cheese and rice, with a mango salsa on top (we ate here several times during the trip and I still drool over this dish).

Day 3 – Surfing Lesson in Lahaina & Beach in Ka’anapali

One of the things I wanted to check off my bucket list while on Maui was trying a surfing lesson, which I had never done before. After some research, we landed on booking a semi-private (2 person) lesson with Rivers To The Sea because of their amazing reviews ($140/person for 1.5 hours).

On the morning of our lesson, we met our instructor at a beach nearby (the instructors pick the location morning-of to make sure you have the best chance of seeing waves). Our instructor was patient, fun, and easy to understand and I was able to stand up and surf a few waves by the end of the 90 minutes, which was so fun!

After the lesson, we had lunch in downtown Lahaina and walked around a bit before heading back to Ka’anapali to relax on the beach and watch the sunset at Ka’anapali Beach.

Day 4 – Whale Watching Tour & Mama’s Fish House

It’s hard to pick favorites, but if I had to, I’d say Day 4 was my favorite of this trip! When we were walking around downtown Lahaina on Day 3, we passed Pacific Whale Foundation and walked into their shop, where we learned about their work conducting research, education, conservation and outreach programs to protect the ocean and its inhabitants. We also learned that they host their own whale watching “ecotours” which help fund their work and got lucky when they had spots open for the next day to join one of their 2 hour sailing tours.

The tour departed from Ma’alaea Harbor at 10:30 am and the ship held about 50 people, but we easily found a seat with a great view and it did not feel crowded. The crew was great and we got lucky enough to see whales almost the entire time. Not going to lie, I cried… it was a beautiful experience I’ll never forget. We followed a mom & baby whale for a while, listened to their sounds with a underwater hydrophone, and saw several breaches.

Note: any time you participate in “animal tourism” when you travel, I highly recommend doing research into the companies you are supporting. There are a lot of companies out there who are exploiting animals instead of helping them, and it’s always worth the extra money to support a company that is doing things for the right reasons, like PacWhale.

After an incredible morning, we went back to the condo to rest & change for dinner at Mama’s Fish House. I booked this reservation a few months in advance and it was so highly recommended by everyone I spoke to before the trip, and everyone on the island. If you value spending money on a special meal like I do, I can’t recommend this restaurant more. The location itself is beautiful, the food was spectacular, and the history of the family is so interesting (check it out here).

Day 5 – Brunch & Massages at The Westin (West Maui); Old Lahaina Luau

Day 5 was my travel companion’s birthday, so I wanted this day to be special. It’s very rare that I splurge on something so luxurious during traveling, but if you’re someone who likes to indulge in a massage on a vacation, I definitely recommend the beach-side massages at The Westin. Booking a massage also gave us access to their relaxation area, which included a rooftop pool overlooking the ocean. It was so relaxing and well worth the money!

For dinner, we went to the famed Old Lahaina Luau. If you’re looking to experience an authentic luau while on Maui, I would recommend this one! The food was a little lackluster after having Mama’s Fish House the night before, but the entertainment easily made up for it. Do your resarch on luau options to make sure you’re getting the kind of experience you want – we opted for a more traditional, authentic luau and really enjoyed it.

Day 6 – Morning Yoga & Relaxing Final Day at Kapalua Beach

Though we didn’t stay at The Westin, when we visited they were offering yoga on a small area of grass right next to the ocean most mornings for $20/class. I went three times and each time I felt so grounded after. It was a great way to start the day.

On our last day, we wanted to relax so we didn’t make any plans and spent most of the day hanging out on Kapalua Beach. We also ate at the nearby restaurant The Gazebo, which is a well-known “hidden gem” on West Maui with delicious breakfast & lunch and beautiful views. We spent the last night soaking in the sunset views from our balcony and dreaming about the next time we’d get to visit West Maui.