Megan Shute for Only In Your State talks about haunted road trips in Hawaiʻi. Our volcano tours are a luxurious, educational and fun way to celebrate the Halloween Season or any season for that matter.
From haunted roads to hotels with guests of the paranormal variety, Hawaiʻi Island is home to various ghosts who have decided to make the island their permanent resting place in the afterlife. If you’re up for a spooky trip, check out this 9-stop terrifying road trip around Hawaiʻi’s Big Island.
The entire trip is 136 miles from the Kuamoo Burials to the Volcano House Hotel, and will take you just over three hours, not including stops. While this trip is easily completed in one day, we do suggest you stay one night at any of the three hotels on this list for a paranormal lodging experience. The best part about this road trip is that you can visit six out of the nine stops without leaving Kailua-Kona.
Kuamoo Burial Grounds
Also known as the Lekeleke Burial Grounds, this historic Hawaiʻian burial site is the resting place for warriors killed during a major battle in 1819.
Sheraton Kona Resort + Spa at Keauhou Bay
Formerly the Keauhou Bay Resort, and before that the Kona Surf, the hotel has been haunted for years. Guests have called to complain of two little girls playing in the hallways, but there is nothing the security guards can do, as they know the girls are mere ghosts. Staff also tell of a ghost that stands at the cliff in front of the hotel on occasion, disappearing when you look away and then look back again. To the locals, it is obvious why there is so much paranormal activity – the hotel was built on an ancient battleground.
Site of the former Kona Lagoon Resort
Though the hotel was torn down in 2004, it is said to have been haunted by supernatural twin sisters who used to live in the area before the hotel was built. Footsteps, chanting, cries and screams have all been reported on the hotel’s upper floors. Most employees who worked there left, and the building sat vacant after Japanese developers abandoned the hotel in 1988. The grounds are still considered to be haunted, and are accessible via the public beach.
King Kamehameha’s Kona Beach Hotel
King Kamehameha is rumored to have been buried on or near the hotel grounds. Anyone who seeks the supernatural will want to visit the hotel’s top floor, where guests have heard sounds of battle, and apparitions of warriors. A portrait of Queen Liliuokalani, located on the ground floor, has been said to inhale and exhale before your very own eyes.
Hulihee Place
Once a vacation getaway for Hawaiʻian royalty, the palace was built from coral and lava rock in 1838, and is said to be haunted by the ghost of a young boy.
Palani Road
A woman died in a car crash on Palani Road during the 1950s – it was a rainy, moonless night, and the roads were rather slick. The woman was upset because she had supposedly caught her lover with another woman. She was driving too fast, and the car slid out of control and hit a tree head on near a hairpin turn. There have been several accidents in this same spot since then, and all the drivers claim to have seen a woman standing in the middle of the road, soaking wet and crying; the drivers say that they crashed trying to avoid the woman.
King’s Trail
An old coastal rock trail built by King Kamehameha I who ruled the Hawaiʻian Islands from 1795 to 1819. The trail circled the Big Island and served as a major traveling route for native Hawaiʻians. Legend says that the ghosts of ancient Hawaiʻian warriors still use the trail. There are reports of a procession of disembodied flickering torches and the sounds of drumming, chanting and battle cries.
Saddle Road
Route 200 traverses the width of Hawaiʻi Island from Waimea to Hilo, and was once considered to be the most dangerous road in the state, with various one-lane bridges and sub-par pavement maintenance. It is also considered to be haunted. Like Oahu’s “pork over the Pali story,” legend has it that if you carry pork over saddle road, your car may break down or experience something supernatural.
Volcano House Hotel
A former historic and private residence, the former owner and his family claimed to see an apparition of an elderly woman. She has also been seen in guest rooms, and wandering the halls. Sightings of a ghostly white dog have also been reported on the entrance road to the hotel.
Who’s ready for the ultimate spooky adventure on Hawaiʻi Island?
