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18 Minutes Away. Yet Waikiki can be a disappointment. The beaches are getting crowded. Some of the new hotels (such as the 535-room Outrigger, opening this month) are designed to be low on price and sparing on service. The shops and sightseeing in Honolulu itself are still the most varied, and new attractions, such as the performing dolphins at Taylor Pryor's Sea Life Park at Makapuu Point, draw enthusiastic visitors. But the visitors do not necessarily return to stay at Waikiki. Peter Lawford, Frank Sinatra and Sammy Davis Jr. are now moving out to the sleek, discreet $11 million Kahala Hilton on the more exclusive, eastern side of Diamond Head. Even farther away, Chinn Ho has broken ground for a 5,000-acre resort at isolated Makaha, which will be the first to put adequate hotel space close to the superb northern surfing beaches on Oahu.
Increasingly, tourists in search of Hawaii's fabled charms look beyond Oahu. Jackie Kennedy visited Laurance Rockefeller's ranch house at the 265,000-acre Parker ranch on the "Big Island" of Hawaii this summer. Barbara Hutton tried the Royal Lahaina Hotel on Maui. Lynda Bird picked Kauai for her latest trip.
In the wake of the trend setters, a wave of tourists is now heading for the island resorts. Long Island Banker Patrick Clifford and his wife Mary are typical. They have made four trips to Hawaii in the past four years, and not once left Oahu. But, says Mary, "I'm so disappointed at the way Waikiki's been built up." This year, they will see all three of the major outer islands.
Five years ago, two-thirds of Hawaii's visitors saw only Oahu. Today, two-thirds of them see at least one Neighbor Island. And why not? Maui and Kauai are only $12.57 and 18 minutes away by DC-9 jet; Hawaii's Kona airport is a mere 43 minutes and $16.95 by turboprop Convair. Air-taxi services also operate to the 15 state and private airstrips on the islands, offer island-hopping tours for as little as $75.
Day on the Moon. What is enticing the tourists farther afield is not the search for better weather. All the islands of the southernmost state- enjoy a year-round balmy climate (average mean temperature: 75°). And, because of the prevailing northeast trade winds, the southwestern coasts of all of its islands (and not just Oahu) are nearly rain-free all year round.
The lure of the outer islands is their spectacular scenery. On the oldest and most fertile island, Kauai, spreading Plumiera (frangipani), symmetrical Norfolk pine, fragrant pikake blossoms and the umbrella-shaped monkeypod trees set off lush folded ridges, twisting valleys and cascading waterfalls. Youthful (2,800,000-year-old) Hawaii has arid, cactus-sprinkled, sleepily sloping uplands, rain forests, anthurium and macadamia groves, bizarre moonscapes of rock lava topped by the snow-capped peaks of Mauna Kea (13,796 ft.) and still-active Mauna Loa (13,680 ft.). Middle-aged Maui is dominated by the rugged crater of dormant Haleakala (House of the Sun). At its rim nestles a Defense Department observatory; the pack trip to the floor of the crater is like spending a day on the moon.