It was an ordinary day. Reading a story titled "Maui Cultural Lands" which brought back memories from years ago when my wife and I traveled to Maui on vacation. When wildfires tore though Maui's west side in August 2023, killing 102 people, destroying 1,400 homes, and incinerating over 20,000 trees, the future of tourism to the Valley Isle was thrown into question. Now, with nearly 85% of the island's jobs still reliant on the tourism industry, Maui is at a cross-roads. While local resorts housed 8,000 displaced residents in 40 hotels for months after the fires, many residents blamed the fire's quick spread partially on their clear-cutting and non-native landscaping. Hoping to secure more resident housing, Maui's mayor proposed a bill to eliminate 7,000 short-term rentals by 2026, which is currently being contested. An island that has, since a strategic pivot to tourism over 40 years ago, depended on tourism for economic growth is searching for a sustainable way forward. So when Maui officially reopened to tourism in November, it leaned more heavily into a new ethos: regenerative tourism, in which visitors volunteer and make conscious choices to support locally owned and environmentally sound businesses, with the aim of leaving the islands better because of their visit. Maui Cultural Lands (MCL), one of the longest-running Indigenous-owned nonprofits in west Maui, provides visitors hand-on ways to make their vacation count. Since 1999, Maui Cultural Lands has been taking volunteers out to pull invasive plants, replant baby trees, or plant native seedlings along the watershed in Honokowai. MCL director Ekolu Lindsey, a native Hawaiian whose Lahaina house was destroyed in the fires, has welcomed hundreds of volunteers since tourists returned. "This is not ecotourism," Lindsey says, referencing an industry vulnerable to greenwashing. "We are going to work, and it's fun." He teaches about Hawaiin culture, where aloha means adding value to your presence. "We help people think of Hawaii as home," he says, "Not your home, but someone's home." After the fires, Duane Sparkman, one of Lindsey's board members and chief engineer at Royal Lahaina Resort, began cataloging the thousands of beloved native trees - like mountain apple and kukui net - that were lost from local backyards. MCL quickly partnered with Sparkman's newly create nonprofit Treecovery, which is now reforesting Lahaina and Kula at no cost to residents. "We're bringing tourists in to help rebuild," Sparkman says. Today, visitors can see the trees they planted through MCL and Treecovery growing around Lahaina, and in Ka'anapali resort lobbies. Other Maui resorts work with similar projects, like Fairmont Kea Lani's partnership with Skyline Conservation, through which guests can donate or volunteer to restore native forests. After the work, more fun awaits. In Lahaina, Mala Ocean Tavern and Aloha Mixed Plate are open for dining, as is Moku Roots, which relocated to Upcountry after the fires. Visit the Old Lahaina Lu'au, considered the state's most authentic tourist-facing cultural performance, or Maui Ku'ia Cacoa Farm. In June, the venerable Kapalua Food and Wine Festival returned, and in October, the state's largest celebration of food, the Hawai'i Food and Wine Festival, returns to Ka'anapli. Tourism on Maui remains fraught. While touristy areas like Wailea appear untouched, roughly 1,600 Lahaina residents were still displaced as of May. Signs in restaurant windows urge visitors not to ask workers about their experiences with the fires. For now, Hawaii lovers can do their small part by getting their hands dirty, then savoring loco moco whipped up with aloha. Written by Michele Bigley. PS - I'm not quite sure that my 80 year old body can take all the work load that this story suggests. I think I'll wait another few years before trying to head back to Maui once again. Sorry! It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.
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