Maui/Molokai gravel or road rides?

[sethschmautz]

On the plane to Maui with my wife to celebrate our 15th. We brought our gravel bikes. We are going to ride the road to Hana and West Maui. We were thinking about taking the ferry to Molokai and cruising around for a day there. Any recommendations on rides on either Maui or Molokai that we should check out?

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[singlesline]

Riding down from the volcano if you can get someone to shuttle you (or if you want to abuse yourself and ride the whole thing up). And doesn't have to be with the bikes but try to get up there for sunrise if you can--they do timed releases for tickets at 7AM 48 hours in advance, so start tomorrow morning. Have both of you logged in to the park service and refreshing the page at 6:59 and hope one of you get it...keep trying until 2 days before your trip ends.

Not gravel, but the trails in Kahakapao recreation area are pretty fun and you can rent MTBs nearby at Krank Cycles (or maybe ride the easier stuff on gravel bikes? it has been a few years and I don't remember).

Can you take bikes on the ferry to Lanai? That could be cool too (especially since you can't really walk anywhere there, and getting a car rented is a PITA). Go see the shipwreck, and of course, visit the cat sanctuary.

[rideit]

I would do this again.



The loop round the west half of the island to Lahaina is insanely good.

[jamal]

I brought my cx bike with 40 slicks specifically for the loop around haleakala. It's far. 137mi, 11k feet, 11 hours total from where I started and finished. I went clockwise, which puts a big climb near the end. Maybe I'd try it the other way? Road on the other side is very remote. I didn't find any of the dirt to be too rough compared to stuff I usually ride but there are some sharp edges on the cattle guards that can ruin your day. Between paia and hana you want to keep a good pace and be good at riding around cars. There can be a lot of traffic and some really shitty and reckless driving goes on along with the standard distracted tourists trying to stop and park at every waterfall. At the same time I thought it was fine because on the descents to every little creek/waterfall I could go as fast or faster than cars and then on the way back out I was going slower and easy to pass. It's pretty fun, but also kind of hard road riding as you're constantly climbing or descending or cornering. Also I got rained on really hard for a few minutes and that made my feet and taint and chain fairly unhappy for the rest of the day.

Even after hana there was a good amount of traffic until I got past the national park entrance and a few popular beaches and waterfalls and trails over there. Then hardly anyone until I was back around to the front. There's like one store that is maybe open and maybe in some guy's house and not really anything else and I doubt very good cell service.

West loop was pretty neat, again, you get pretty far out there. Very few services along the way. Occasional asshole drivers. Some pretty busy sections of highway.

Climbing the volcano is awesome. Even on a hot sunny day the descent will be cold so bring more clothes than you think you need if you go up.

And all these are really big rides. I'm not sure there's enough daylight to do most of them right now so start really early and bring good lights.

The other fun one I did was just riding down the coast to the lava flow south of wailei.

west loop
https://www.strava.com/activities/7010123159

volcano
https://www.strava.com/activities/7015531668

lava flow
https://www.strava.com/activities/7019888788

hana loop
https://www.strava.com/activities/7025616478

[rideit]

My rental bike, loaded for bear.

[sethschmautz]

Thanks all. We did the west loop last time we were here and are planning an out and back this time as the remote section was great and the highway was, well, highway. Definitely going to stop for banana bread.

I appreciate the beta on the Hana road. That's on the list also. We rode a little way up Haleakala last time and will probably skip it this time.

Going to take the bikes to Molokai on the ferry and ride the south east shore. Sounds great, about 60 miles and should give us some time to stop and swim, etc.

I'll keep a lookout for additional suggestion here again. Thanks again.

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[singlesline]

My favorite banana bread is at Hana Farms on the way to Hana.

[sethschmautz]

Just checking in to say we rode Kihei South, Haleakala and a West Maui out and back (did the loop a few years ago and didn't love the highway back to Lahaina. Thanks for the beta.

One of the highlights of the rides were definitely the little old ladies taking pictures with our bikes at the top of Haleakala so they could try to convince their friends back home that they rode to the top!

Seth

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[rideit]

Kudos, kidz!
Love that ride.
So much.

[bennymac]

nice! this is making me want to plan a bike trip to Maui

[jamal]

yeah it's pretty cool. up the volcano was great, had me wishing for my fancy light road bike over the cx bike but it was fine



made good use of the chunky tires over on the far side of the island though. so far out there



so many loose chickens, so many burnt out cars. expect to spend a lot of money on food.

[rideit]

I rented a decente Specialized Roubais, but the gearing was 34/34 for some dumb reason. My CX bike is 32/40! That was pretty rough on the Upper Baxter Road extra credit (15% + grades!) . If I go again, i'll bring My own cassette and chain.

[rideit]

Pro tip: Costco run.