Mauna Kea Summit and Stars

The Mauna Kea summit an stars stargazing tour takes you to the peak of Mauna Kea to see an amazing sunset from the tallest volcano on our planet, and afterwards to a private location for a professional stargazing experience.

Pickup and return

This tour depart from Kona between 1pm and 3pm (there are several pickup locations north of Kona towards MaunaKea). The 7 to 8 hour (round trip) tour will have you back in time for desert at your own place.

Picnic Dinner at the visitor center

During the tour you travel up Mauna Kea for a small-group sunset and stargazing tour by luxury 4WD van. Leave the off-road drive to the pros, and ride from Kona or Waikoloa to the Maunakea visitor information station to enjoy a warm picnic dinner while you acclimate to a higher elevation and learn about Hawaiian star navigation before you head to the summit.

Sunset viewing at the Maunakea Summit

After dinner you continue to the Mauna Kea summit (the Big Island’s tallest peak) for sunset. Mauna Kea is hands-down our favorite location in the state to see the sun set, as the combination of all the sunset colors with world-class telescopes, an ocean of clouds, and many volcanic tuft cones, is magical.

Stargazing

After sunset you head down the mountain to a dark and secluded location to observe constellations and hear commentary from your guide, while keeping warm with the provided jackets and hot chocolate.

Your guide brings two powerful telescopes for stargazing: an 11” Celestron Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope and a Stellina Observation station. This latter telescope is part camera and part telescope and has an integrated camera that is used by your guide to take HD pictures of deep space objects. These pictures will be send to you by your guide after the tour as yet another souvenir of this unique experience.

Maunakea Summit & Stars Give Back Experience

The Mauna Kea Stars and Summit experience can be combined with an extra stop during which you are invited to “give back” to the island by helping out with conservation work at the Waikoloa Dry Forest Initiative!

This Give Back experience only takes place on Wednesdays and differs from the Mauna Kea Stars and Summit experience in the following ways:

• You depart 75 minutes earlier than the standard Mauna Kea Summit and Stars to make a 1 hour stop at a rare and endangered native dry forest habitat.
• Participate in some conservation work such as seed collection, while learning about The Waikoloa Dryforest Initiative and how they are revitalizing critical habitat.
• A portion of the proceeds from each guest is donated to the Waikoloa Dryforest Initiative to perpetuate their conservation work.

Why is the Mauna Kea Summit so special?

For astronomers Hawaiʻi is one of the best places of the world to observe the stars. There are many world-class observatories on the 4,207 m (13,802 ft) high summit, which looks so other worldly that is also used to simulate living on other planets for months at a time!

If you like looking at the stars or telescopes a visit to the Big Island is not complete without some serious stargazing. What better place to do so than on the highest volcano in the state?

From the summit you can see the sun dip below the clouds in a spectacular explosion of color, framed by (snowy) peaks, old volcanoes, and futuristic world class telescopes.

MaunaKea facts and trivia 🤩

MaunaKea erupted last more than 4000 years ago and is not considered an active volcano anymore.  The MaunaKea summit is the highest point of the state of Hawaiʻi, 13.796 ft above sea level. There have even been glaciers on the volcano during colder periods!

The story of Maunakea gets better. Because the volcanoes on the Big Island are so heavy and because a large part of the volcanoes is hidden under water, MaunaKea is actually higher than Mount Everest. Measured  from the base on the ocean floor MaunaKea rises over 10,000 m (33,000 ft) high!

Image credit for most images used on this page: Hawaii Forest & Trail.

Hawaii Forest & Trail is a highly respected local tour company that has operated on the Big Island since 1993.  They have gained access to private and restricted lands and are widely recognized as a tour company that has passionate and knowledgeable interpretative guides, all of which translates into consistent stellar reviews from their past guests.

Hawaii Forest & Trail is fully certified by the Sustainable Tourism Association of Hawai’i. This means that their tours are eco-friendly, culturally educational and operate as sustainable as possible.

Knowledgeable Staff

The HFT staff are picked to have strong academic backgrounds in biology, geology, Hawaiian culture and history, and extensive natural history field experience. It’s not enough for the guides to simply “know things”, they must also have a real passion for Hawaii’s natural world and enthusiasm for sharing it.

Giving back to the community

The vision of Hawaii Forest & Trail is to share the splendor of Hawai’i and inspire a deep connection with our natural world. They donate a small amount ($1 per guest) to a fund that makes donations to non-profit organizations whose mission and work aligns with at least one of the following criteria:

• benefits the conservation of Hawaii’s native ecosystems, species and landscapes.
• promulgates the understanding and practice of Hawaiian culture and the dissemination and understanding of Hawaii’s natural and cultural history.
• promotes and facilitates an appreciation and interaction with nature, especially programs that are youth oriented.

It is the intent of the fund to give preference to entities who are based or whose work is performed in the communities where they operate tours.

We are affiliate partners with Hawaii Forest and Trail and any booking on this page you make is made directly with Hawaii Forest and Trail. We receive a percentage from the activity provider for each successful booking made through our website but this happens without any additional charge to you. (read more on the use of those links on our website here).

By booking tours through our website you support LoveBigIsland.com and help us to provide you and future visitors with free and high quality information about the Big Island. Thanks, you guys are amazing!