Everything in this annual volume represents in one way or another

our own experience or opinions. This is not to say that we have

personally eaten in every restaurant, slept in all the hotels, and taken

every new tour offered over the past 12 months, although we certainly

do a lot of that kind of thing. Nevertheless, as the saying goes, "We

know the territory."

If you re looking for mistakes, well, we re sure you ll find a few

authentic Boners (as well as a couple of bad puns). This is the

eleventh edition of the first book in a series of guides to Pacific parts

of the world. (The others are The Maverick Guide to New Zealand and The

Maverick Guide to Australia.) For this reason, we would like your help. If

you see an error or note a change in any entry since we investigated it,

we d appreciate it tremendously if you would send the information to

us in care of the publisher. You may thereby become one of our most

critical editors for subsequent editions. (Use the special letter-envelope

on the back page, or write us reams in your own envelope.) Incidentally,

we try very hard to answer every letter that we receive.

Let it not be said here that you cannot visit Hawaii without a

guidebook. Lots of people do. There are plenty of guided tours that

begin by strapping you in on the Mainland and that don t let you off

the leash again until you re back home. And there are other visitors

who say they do not intend to leave the beach (ouch!) for the entire

length of their sun-drenched vacation.

There are also many hotel desk clerks and tour guides to direct you

to places in which they or their companies have financial interests. You

can get along with these recommendations--in the same way that an

automobile that is designed to run more smoothly on low-cost regular

gasoline gets along only jerkily when it is fed expensive, high-test

fuel instead.

But we want to keep you rolling smoothly and economically, while at

the same time gently guiding you along adventuresome beaches and

byways. There you can find your own individual fun, as we have done,

here in the Hawaiian Islands.