HONAUNAU — An ancient South Kona fishing village and trail is set to be placed in public hands, thanks to the efforts of the Ala Kahakai National Historic Trail and The Trust For Public Land Hawaii.
HONAUNAU — An ancient South Kona fishing village and trail is set to be placed in public hands, thanks to the efforts of the Ala Kahakai National Historic Trail and The Trust For Public Land Hawaii.
This is the first ever land purchase for Ala Kahakai. It comprises 59 acres of shoreline just south of Puuhonua o Honaunau National Historical Park and is likely to clear escrow sometime in July.
The $3.5 million purchase of the Pace family property sets the stage for preservation of the Kauleoli Fishing Village, its accompanying canoe hale, salt-making ponds, agricultural areas and essentially the entire shoreline of the Kauleoli ahupuaa. Funding for the purchase was provided by the Water &Land Conservation Fund through the National Rivers &Trails Initiative.
The legislation that created Ala Kahakai in 2000 also authorized it to make land purchases from willing sellers, said Aric Arakaki, superintendent for the trail corridor. Although the organization hadn’t exercised that authority until now, the time was right to protect property near the national park, he said.
When you look south from the park, you see mostly long slopes of green, as the land was in antiquity. It should stay that way, Arakaki said.
“There were attempts to build on the land that would have taken the view plane and shattered the ambiance of the park,” he said.
“The Trail,” a 175-mile network steeped in culture and history, traverses hundreds of Native Hawaiian settlements, cultural sites and wahi pana from the tip of North Kohala to Puna. It is cared for by area descendants as in the days of old, and is administered by the National Park Service. However, the Kauleoli lands will not become part of the national park.
A community planning process to shape the parcel’s future has already begun and will continue, Arakaki said.
Kealakekua resident Greg Cote dripped sweat and hung onto a bottle of water on Thursday as he and California residents Lyndon Cole and Nicole Thibeau navigated the 1871 Trail, a portion of the Ala Kahakai which runs from the national park toward the land under purchase.
Cote has been coming here for decades to find silence — and solace.
“If I ever had any of those bad times in life, I’d always hike down here, sit on a rock and exhale,” he said. “It’s such a cleansing place down here. It really is.”
Solace can indeed be found among the ruins. The remnants of ancient stone foundations, trails, rock walls and heiau give structure to an otherwise fairly level landscape of lava shoreline, kiawe trees and brush. The trail is exposed where it runs along the shore and headlands, but shaded in the groves.
“The lineal descendants of the area have been caring for the trail,” said Laura Kaakua, native lands project manager for The Trust For Public Land. “Now, under the ownership of Ala Kahakai, the trail but also the makai lands will have educational, cultural and stewardship opportunities not just for the descendants but anyone who is interested in volunteering.”
The land connects to the southern boundary of the national park at another ancient fishing village, Kiilae, which was added to the park in 2006 through another purchase assisted by the TPL. The land trust and Ala Kahakai have been working with area descendants for several years to bring the purchase to fruition, Kaakua said.
Email Bret Yager at byager @westhawaiitoday.com.