Hiking the Kaiwi Shoreline Trail on Oʻahu
Distance: 2.0 - 3.5 miles / 3.2 - 5.6 km
The distance above is variable because it depends on which route you take and how far you choose to hike. It’s a pretty easy walk from Kaloko Beach to Alan Davis, but with all of the turns you could possibly make, you may end up on any number of routes.
Kaiwi Coastline Trailhead Parking
Parking for the Kaiwi Coast is either at Kaloko Beach or the Makapuʻu Lighthouse Trailhead. In this post, I start at Kaloko Beach and hike toward Makapuʻu.
Know that the parking lot for Kaloko Beach is not suitable for low clearance vehicles.
Google Maps Directions: Kaloko Beach / Makapuʻu Lighthouse Trailhead
Hiking the Kaiwi Shoreline Trail
From the parking lot at Kaloko Beach, you can either explore the Kaloko restoration area by going right at the sign, or take the path to the left of the sign to continue on the Kaiwi Shoreline Trail.
Kaloko Beach Restoration Area
The Kaloko Beach Restoration Area is a great place to find different native Hawaiian plants like ʻIlima, Mauʻu ʻakiʻaki, and Pāʻū o Hiʻiaka.
In my opinion, Kaloko along with Alan Davis Beach are really two of the main highlights on this hike, so I definitely wouldn’t skip this short walk down the beach.
After making it to the end of Kaloko, you have to turn back around to the sign to continue hiking on the Kaiwi Coast.
Kaiwi Shoreline Trail
To the left of the trail sign will be this historic bridge to continue along the Kaiwi Shoreline. The amount of turns to be able to continue hiking along the shoreline can be very confusing, and I recommend using Google Maps satellite or following along this post as you hike because it’s not a very straight forward trail to Alan Davis.
At the split past the bridge, go right then right again.
At this split you can either go right to explore the beach or left to continue toward Alan Davis Beach.
Getting Around the Kaloko Inlet
The tide truly determines if you should follow the inlet here or not. To avoid it altogether, go left to at the photo on the left, and at the photo on the right, go right to continue toward Alan Davis Beach.
If you did avoid the inlet, then you need to make this right turn on the less obvious trail. Going straight will still lead to Alan Davis, but the hike is much more boring as opposed to returning to the coast as I did in the following photos.
After reaching the far extension of the inlet in the photo above, go right at the split in the photo below.
At this point, getting to Alan Davis is a straightforward walk along coast. There are no more turns that you need to remember.
For the sake of showing the rest of the trail, I continued toward the Makapuʻu Lighthouse Trail, but after leaving Alan Davis Beach, the fastest way back to Kaloko is by taking a left and staying on the main dirt road back.
There’s no turns to make in order to make it back to the bridge from the beginning of the hike.
Native Plants on the Kaiwi Coast
Other than native Hawaiian plants, the Kaiwi Shoreline Trail is one of the best places to see the endemic Hylaeus bees on Oʻahu. I saw a number of them and even got a few pictures, but I will have to be back with my camera to get something of better quality.
If you’re looking for them, know that they are tiny (about half a cm. long), and their yellow face is about the size of a grain of sand.
As for native Hawaiian plants, I mentioned a few earlier, but you can also find ʻAkulikuli, Naio, Maʻo, and Pōhuehue to name a few more. Please do what you can to minimize your impact here as most of the restoration work is done by some great volunteers.
If you would like to learn more about identifying these native Hawaiian plants and tons more, check about separate post below.
Read My Separate Post: Native Hawaiian Plant Guide
