Explore Kahului

The Alexander & Baldwin Sugar Museum stands in Puʻunēnē, about 3 km south of Kahului, in the 1902 house of the superintendent of the neighbouring sugar mill. It tells the story of Maui's sugar industry, which ended with the last harvest in 2016, and of the plantation workers who came from Asia, Europe and the Pacific. A working model shows how the mill machinery ran.

The Bailey House Museum in Wailuku, about 4 km from Kahului, occupies a mission house begun in 1833 and later the home of the missionary teachers Edward and Caroline Bailey. Run by the Maui Historical Society, it shows Hawaiian tools, featherwork and a koa canoe, Edward Bailey's 19th-century landscape paintings of Maui and the surfboard of Duke Kahanamoku.

ʻĪao Valley State Monument lies in the West Maui Mountains about 5 km west of Wailuku and 8 km from Kahului. Its landmark is the ʻĪao Needle, Kūkaemoku, a green-clad ridge of rock rising about 365 m from the valley floor. In 1790 the valley saw the Battle of Kepaniwai, in which Kamehameha I defeated Maui's army. A short paved path leads to a lookout.

Maui Ocean Center is an aquarium at Māʻalaea Harbor, about 11 km south of Kahului, opened in 1998 and devoted to the marine life of Hawaiʻi. Its largest exhibit, an open-ocean tank of about 2.8 million litres, is crossed by a walk-through acrylic tunnel among sharks and rays. Other galleries show living corals, sea turtles and the humpback whales that winter off Maui.

Hoʻokipa Beach Park lies on Maui's north shore near Pāʻia, about 12 km east of Kahului. Strong trade winds and waves make it a centre for windsurfing, kitesurfing and, in winter, big-wave surfing, with international windsurfing contests held offshore. From the lookout on the cliff visitors watch the riders, and green sea turtles often rest on the sand in the late afternoon.