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A Path through Prehistory

Walking the Mahaulepu Coastal Heritage Trail on Kauai's south shore is like traveling back in time.

people riding horses on a beach
ABOVE: Riders from CJM Country Stables tour Mahaulepu Beach.

 

Starting at Shipwreck Beach, you ascend the Makawehi Cliffs—125,000-year-old lithified sand dunes—following an unmarked but easy-to-follow trail. At the top you're greeted by an ancient landscape sculpted by wind, surf, salt spray and rainfall. 

The trail continues to the Makauwahi Cave Reserve, Hawaii's largest limestone cave and one of the richest fossil sites in the Islands, revealing flora and fauna from as far back as 6,500 years ago, including over forty bird species (nearly half of them extinct) and evidence of coastal plants thought to live only in upland areas. The cave trail is lined with native flora—more than fifty species have been planted throughout the reserve's dry forest—one of the rarest habitat types in the Islands. 

a rocky beach with waves crashing on it

The Mahaulepu Coastal Heritage Trail on Kauai begins at Shipwreck Beach and climbs the Makawehi Cliffs. The route passes Makauwahi Cave Reserve, one of the richest fossil sites in the Islands.

 

Across a stream just beyond the cave, Mahaulepu Beach is a two-mile-long stretch of wild, remote coastline, magical in its isolation. Mahaulepu means "falling together"; the beach is named for a battle that took place here in the fourteenth century, when Kauai repelled invaders from Hawaii Island. The beach goes from Punahoa Point, made of dunes formed about 350,000 years ago, to Paoo Point. Here on the white-sand beaches, you might see volunteers from Malama Mahaulepu maintaining the native plantings and restoring opihi (limpet snail) communities in the rocky tidepools. The nonprofit is dedicated to preserving this last stretch of accessible undeveloped coastline on Kauai.

Communities around the state are working to preserve more land in the face of development pressures, but few of these areas are as unique—and accessible—as Mahaulepu. Apart from Niihau, Kauai is geologically the oldest of the main Hawaiian Islands, and richest in paleoecology. "From the peak of Mount Haupu to the limestone headlands, beaches, Mahaulepu is a living museum where we can be immersed in the five-million-year sweep of natural and human history," says Beryl Blaich, board president of Malama Mahaulepu. "As Koloa and Poipu have urbanized since the 1970s, protecting undeveloped Mahaulepu is ever more important. This storied place is critically important as a rest stop on the superhighway of modern life."

malama-mahaulepu.orgOpens external link to page that may not meet accessibility guidelines


Story By Ben Davidson

Photos By Ben Davidson

a person on a paddle board in the water V27 №2 April–May 2024