Hiking Tours
Tours in Hawaii.

ATV Outfitters Hawaii runs guided ATV and side-by-side tours across the working cattle ranches of the Big Island's North Kohala coast, between the towns of Hawi and Kapaau. Routes follow ranch roads through rolling pasture, ironwood windbreaks, and old sugar cane haul roads down to dramatic sea-cliff overlooks where humpback whales pass close to shore in winter. Guides share the layered history of the district — pre-contact Hawaiian heiau sites, the 19th-century Kohala Sugar plantation, and the paniolo (Hawaiian cowboy) tradition still practiced on the ranches the tours cross. The deeper Kohala Waterfall Adventure continues inland into a forested gulch with a swimming hole at the base of a year-round waterfall. Both single-rider ATV and two-seat side-by-side formats are available, and all tours stay on private ranch land so the routes remain uncrowded.

Kayak Kauai has guided paddlers on the rivers and coastlines of Kauai for more than four decades from its base in Kapa'a on the island's eastern shore. Their signature trip is a flatwater tour up the Wailua River — the only navigable river in the Hawaiian Islands — paddling between hau-vine canopy and hibiscus to a short rainforest hike ending at the Fern Grotto, a lava-rock amphitheater hung with sword ferns that is one of the most sacred sites in Wailua, the ancient seat of Kauai royalty. In summer, when the north shore surf lays down, guides lead advanced sea-kayak expeditions along the Na Pali Coast, a seventeen-mile run of fluted sea cliffs, sea caves, and waterfall-fed beaches accessible only by water. Additional tours explore the Hanalei River through taro lo'i and into the Hanalei National Wildlife Refuge, prime habitat for the endangered nene goose, koloa duck, and Hawaiian stilt. All trips emphasize the cultural geography of Kauai as much as the paddling itself.

Kohala Zipline operates a guided canopy zipline tour high in the rainforest of the Kohala Mountains on the northern tip of the Big Island, just outside the historic plantation town of Hawi. The three-hour course traces nine ziplines and five suspension sky bridges through a mature native forest of koa, ohia lehua, and tree ferns, with views opening over deep gulches carved by the trade-wind rains. Guides interpret the ecology and cultural history of North Kohala, the boyhood home of King Kamehameha I, and point out endemic birds such as the apapane and amakihi feeding in the ohia canopy. The route is engineered as a true canopy tour rather than a series of long crossings — riders stay within the forest rather than above it, descending platform by platform through one of the wettest and most biodiverse pockets of the Big Island. Tours run year-round and are limited to small groups so the forest understory stays quiet enough to hear the birds.