Then the wind found it. Just two miles east at Hoʻokipa, the relentless trade winds and reef break combine into some of the most consistent windsurfing conditions on earth, and through the 1980s and 1990s the pioneers of the sport set up shop in town and made Pāʻia known the world over as the "Windsurfing Capital of the World." The same winds now draw kitesurfers and foilers too. The giant winter wave at Jaws (Peʻahi) lies just beyond, and green sea turtles haul out to rest on the sand at Hoʻokipa — watched, by law, from a respectful distance. And all the while Pāʻia kept its oldest job: the last town to gas up, grab food and turn east onto the 64-mile Road to Hāna.
The Pāʻia Sugar Mill finally closed in 2000, ending the era that started it all — but the town it left behind, home to only a couple thousand residents, is thriving on its own terms: a beloved, low-key surf-and-art town where windward surf culture and upcountry ranching mingle and, rare on Maui, it all still feels like old Maui. Our Pāʻia designs gather that spirit into wearable form. Pāʻia — Maui's bohemian sugar town, where the trade winds blow and the road to Hāna begins.
Why People Visit Pāʻia
Pāʻia offers a whole mood in one small town: bohemian, barefoot charm, world-class wind and surf, and the romance of the open road to Hāna. It is the coolest little town on Maui — and for the artists, surfers and free spirits who live here, simply home, the place where old Maui still feels like itself.
