Many attractions popular with tourists are open, including Pearl Harbor and Iolani Palace. “So it is, in my opinion, a fait accompli that we’re basically just bringing the virus here and knowingly, willfully doing so,” he said.Ī second test after arrival is required for the Big Island, voluntary for Maui and Kauai, and not required for Oahu, the most populated island. John Alderete, a virologist who lives on Kauai, said it’s not safe to allow tourists during a pandemic. “I think it’s time that we start bringing them back,” he said. But he wants them to wear masks, keep their distance and follow other health orders. John Fielding, an Oahu resident of 35 years, said returning tourists will bring normalcy and economic stability.
Hawaii authorities have arrested some people for violating quarantine. “And they get mad at us.”Įven with the option to produce a negative test, some travelers choose to quarantine for two weeks, whether at hotels, rentals or at home. “Those who are in quarantine, they go out and they don’t care,” Iglesias said. Iglesias said she’s nervous about staying safe at work, pointing to guests who have ignored health orders.
“When tourists are here, it’s packed, there’s traffic.” “But it felt really nice for a while to be tourist-free,” she said of the days spent on less-crowded Waikiki beaches with her family. Aina Iglesias, a guest service agent at a Waikiki hotel, said she’s grateful for an income again. One union member recently went back to work with hesitation. Only 300 out of some 9,000 out-of-work members returned to their jobs when Hawaii welcomed back travelers, de Venecia said, making him wonder if tourism will be the lifeblood it once was. we are not able to occupy or even use because of tourism,” he said, using a word for Native Hawaiians.īut as a communications organizer for a union of hotel workers, de Venecia has “messy” feelings: Many members lost paychecks and medical benefits because of a lack of tourists. “How I see it is there was some silver lining in this pandemic that over the last few months, locals and especially kanaka were able to reclaim some of the spaces. During the pandemic, “I started going there again like I did when I was very young, to go swim in the morning.”īryant de Venecia of Honolulu took up standup paddle-boarding when beaches were less crowded. “I haven’t been down there for a number of years because, frankly, it was just too crowded,” he said.
On Monday, 10,515 passengers arrived, with nearly 5,300 indicating they were coming for vacation, the Hawaii Tourism Authority said.įor English, who represents rural parts of Maui, fewer tourists allowed him to reconnect to Hamoa Beach, his “playground” as a child near where his family has lived for generations. Some residents are worried as cases surge in other parts of the U.S., but Hawaii officials say an “extremely small number” who get tested before traveling are diagnosed after they arrive. “What it proves for us is that old model of tourism, which is, you know, mass bring 11 million visitors a year, didn’t work and people were tired of it.” “What the pandemic did was give us all a moment to pause, a number of months, to rethink everything,” said state Sen. That dropped to several thousand after the quarantine mandate. Locals, many of whom depend on tourism jobs, have long felt ambivalence about living in an island paradise that relies heavily on visitor spending, but many saw an upshot to a health crisis that threatened their livelihoods - reclaiming favorite areas long overrun by crowds.īefore the pandemic, as many as 30,000 visitors arrived a day. They could enjoy Waikiki’s famous beaches without the sunburned tourists and walk on sidewalks without hordes of visitors awestruck by clear blue water, white sand and the other trappings of a tropical getaway. 15, when the travel restrictions eased, and “I waited for hours again.”įor seven months, locals had taken back spots normally crowded with visitors. “I can literally tell you the day that they opened up,” Kruse said.