Home Away From Home in Hawaii

For adventure without the exhaustion factor, head to Marriott’s Ko Olina Beach Club.

Man has an innate spirit of adventure and need for discovery. Paradoxically, man also has a deep need for home, for setting up a base from which to operate. I found myself living this paradox on a recent trip to Hawaii, back to Hawaii, I should say. Specifically, when I arrived for my second annual visit to Marriott’s Ko Olina Beach Club, Oahu’s first and only five-star timeshare project, on the spacious west coast of the island. This would be my and my family’s base from which to explore the many faces of Oahu, and it was a good base. In fact, almost too good; the Beach Club is situated on its own 30 oceanfront acres, with panoramic sunset views of the pristine coastline and undeveloped Waianae Mountains. Fronting the resort is a perfect half-moon bay with kayak, snorkel and aqua-bike rentals, and a beachside bar and grille. Also on property are several large pools, the much lauded Chuck’s Steak House, fitness center, and more. Nearby is an 18-hole championship golf course and the 330-slip marina, from which every sort of sea adventure can launch – sunset sails, shark fishing, snorkeling with dolphins, Scuba…

The villas themselves are another reason to stay on property. Large enough to accommodate up to eight people, with lanais and living and dining areas luxuriously furnished in an Hawaiian plantation style, utilizing naturally warm tones and traditional koa wood furniture. They also have all the amenities: oversized soaking tubs, three large screen TVs, with DVD; WiFi (who among us doesn’t work on vacation anymore?); fully-equipped kitchen – even a washer and dryer. They truly give a warm sense of home – if home had a multi-million-dollar view, concierge and maid service.

All this will make it enjoyably hard to feed your explorer’s sense for adventure and discovery. But try, because one of Ko Olina Beach Club’s greatest assets is its least apparent: Ko Olina is set on Oahu’s open west coast, where the ranges are still vast and the rains are the least frequent. Relaxation comes easy and the true spirit of aloha is alive. Yet Oahu itself offers some of the most diverse of Hawaiian island attractions, such as the nostalgic and buzzing Waikiki, where you can surf a longboard by day and surf a disco floor by night; the iconic Diamond Head, off of which a wave-rich playground exists for the moderate to accomplished surfer; and of course the North Shore, where, depending on the season, you can watch 30-foot waves, dive pristine reefs, or catch a polo match. All this makes Ko Olina a perfect base from which to explore an island that truly has it all.
 

North Shore

In 1997, American essayist William Finnegan wrote, “If the surfing world has a shared mythology, then the North Shore of Oahu is its Olympus. Indeed, this small stretch of northwest-facing coastline is known to surfers as “the seven-mile miracle” for the sheer number of world-class waves lined up side by side from Haleiwa to Sunset beach – nearly 40 in all.

But even for those whose idea of a board room features a large table and mandatory suit and tie, the North Shore is a must-do daytrip. During winter, when contests such as the Pipeline Masters and the Triple Crown are fought in awe-inspiring three-story surf, the show is better than any circus. And in summer, when the waves are nonexistent, the North Shore boasts crystal clear calm water and uncrowded soft sand beaches. And there’s a reason locals refer to this side of the island as “country.” Backed by the towering lava-ribbed hills, the North Shore is still a rural holdout to the booming capitol that is Honolulu, just 22 miles to the south.

August is when we drove the 40-minute cross-island hop from Ko Olina to the historic and picturesque town of Haleiwa – picture Laguna Beach in the ‘50s, with surf shops and shave ice stands replacing art galleries and toffee shops. Tiny in size but huge in legend, Haleiwa is the perfect gateway to the beaches of the North Shore. We crossed the famous Anahulu bridge and headed for Waimea.

Known for some of the biggest, most punishing waves on the planet during winter months, in summer Waimea Bay becomes the friendliest of family beaches, with a parking lot, huge beach and great snorkeling where, in addition to large reef fish, green sea turtle sightings are a given. (My five-year-old daughter explored the inside reef here.)

For lunch, it was a stop at one of the many roadside “shrimp trucks.” Picture an ice-cream truck, only instead of handing out popsicles, the owner fries up every kind of spicy shrimp imaginable and serves it at one of a few small roadside tables. After another few hours of making friends with sea turtles, we headed back to Haleiwa for a North Shore must – shave ice. Our “going country” day complete, we headed back to our west coast luxury.

Waikiki

Waikiki has become the most maligned of Hawaiian towns – the high-rises, the traffic, the crowds… All true. But I am convinced that the people who hate Waikiki are the people who have actually vacationed there, and since Waikiki is home to 60,000 hotel rooms, that’s a lot of maligning going on.

The trick is to stay a comfortable, yet easily accessible, distance away from Hawaii’s most historic spot. I discovered this during our stay at Ko Olina Beach Club, which is but a 20-minute drive from the sand at Waikiki but seemingly light years away from its hustle and bustle.

This let us play tourist for a day and “do” Waikiki right. And there is a lot to do here. If you’ve never surfed, this is the place to ride your first wave, no matter what age you are. And don’t fret, it doesn’t have to be on a surfboard – the famous beachboys at Waikiki will take you out in multi-man outriggers, in which you can surf waves the way the fisherman – and kings – of old did. The waves are gentle enough for the whole family.

Keeping the waterman spirit alive, the place for lunch or dinner is the original Duke’s, named after the father of modern surfing, Olympic gold medal swimmer and Hawaii’s honorary ambassador to the world, Duke Kahanamoku. The Duke, more than any other figure, truly represented the spirit of aloha. Housed in the Outrigger Waikiki Hotel, Duke’s is a blast, with a beachside bar and dance floor that gets packed to capacity nightly, as does the restaurant (get reservations well in advance).

If that’s not your style, visit the Waikiki Aquarium, Honolulu Zoo or take an Atlantis submarine adventure 100 feet below the surface, departing from the Hilton Hawaiian Village.

The whole thing makes for a fun day of exhausting discovery that will have you appreciating your west coast base all the more – both its proximity and solitude.

Diamond Head

Towering over the towers of Waikiki is the iconic Diamond Head, which is so much larger in legend than its mere 761-foot-high peak. Again, a mere 30 minutes from our Ko Olina base, this was another fun day of exploration. In fact, it seemed so close – 30 minutes in a car in Hawaii feels equivalent to four minutes on the 405 – that I got up early to go for a surf in the Diamond Head area and allowed my family to enjoy breakfast by the pool before returning to retrieve them.

If you’re a surfer of any skill level, this is a great area for waves. The waters fronting Diamond Head are home to as many breaks as the North Shore, but none nearly as threatening or crowded. And a new online board rental service, Hawaiisurfboardrentals.com, makes ferrying cumbersome board bags on and off planes a thing of the past. I reserved a board online before I left and it was waiting at the Beach Club when I arrived. When I was through, they came to my door and picked it up – all for less than it would have cost to bring my own board on the plane.

After the surf, it was time for a gentle hike up Diamond Head for a view of Waikiki and the surrounding reefs. The entire thing is less than a few hours and very worth it.

The last few days of our stay were spent back on the Ko Olina property, which was a perfect call. There was a lot more to see in Oahu – we hadn’t ventured to the East Side, where rugged coastline, blowholes and rainforests lie – but one of the major reasons for coming to the state of aloha is to reach a state of, well, aloha. So the perfect half moon beach, the traditional sunset luau on the great beachfront lawn, and most of all, our villa with the priceless sunset views were a siren song we couldn’t resist. This was truly a home away from home, close to adventure, yet so far away as well.

Owning Paradise Marriott’s Ko Olina Beach Club opened in January 2003, offering luxurious fractional ownership of two- and three-bedroom, well-appointed villas located within walking distance of the championship golf course, private marina and the Ihilani Resort & Spa. The Ko Olina Beach Club is one of Marriott Vacation Club International’s largest and most prestigious developments (that’s saying something, considering Marriott Vacation Club manages more than 40 resorts with approximately 7,000 villas worldwide). For more information, visit www.marriott villarentals.com, www.marriott.com, or call (800) 845-5279.

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