KAUAI : Chris Hemmeter’s fantasy island

The truth is, Leilani, I came to check out the new Kauai and wound up rediscovering old Kauai.

The reason I spun off in search of old Kauai is that after strolling through developer Chris Hemmeter’s new $350-million Westin Kauai, I was confused. I couldn’t figure out whether this was Lihue or Las Vegas. Placed alongside Caesars Palace on the Las Vegas strip, the Westin Kauai would fit like a croupier’s glove.

The Porte Cochere would do justice to a maharajah’s palace.

Entering the lobby, guests descend three flights by escalator to the resort’s immense reflecting pool with its seven life-size marble horses rising in the spray of a 60-foot geyser of water. Westin compares the lighted 2.1-acre pond to the fountains of Versailles. (I’m still under the Las Vegas spell.)

This isn’t to say that the Westin isn’t a magnificent resort. But once inside the lobby, I expected plumeria and potted plants rather than Georgian columns. By my count, more columns support the Westin Kauai than shore up the Acropolis in Athens.

In place of Hawaiian artifacts, Westin’s grounds feature a $2.5-million collection of Oriental and Pacific art that’s all part of Chris Hemmeter’s version of “Fantasy Island.”

Employees with walkie-talkies signal room porters, and a dozen stretch limousines deliver new arrivals from the airport by private road. Dozens of carriages drawn by Clydesdales rattle along eight miles of garden paths. Or one can sail down a man-made lagoon in a $250,000 Venetian launch, passing man-made islands populated by exotic birds. Other islands are being stocked with kangaroos, wallabies, gemsbok, zebras, monkeys and llamas.

Somebody in the crowd wondered where the circus wagons were. Had Ringling Bros. gotten sidetracked? Macaws fluttered their wings. Flamingos preened.

Peering from the manicured grounds is a Buddha, not to mention marble dragons, marble turtles and swarms of live swans.

The enormous 800-acre Westin Kauai lagoons occupy the site of the old Kauai Surf at Kalapaki Beach, which Kauai visitors recall with a touch of nostalgia. They argue that Kauai, the Garden Island, got along nicely without Westin’s touch of fantasy. Managing director James Treadway told one writer: “The idea is to have people feel like they’re in heaven.”

To which Kauai’s residents respond that they figured they were in heaven long before Westin invaded their island.

Acquaintances of an island-born resident checked out after one night, trading Westin’s fantasy island for a condo on a peaceful, uncrowded beach.

Charles Cassetty, a 68-year-old insurance executive from Gainsboro, Tenn., confessed he was impressed by the service but found the 847-room hotel “not much different from one I stayed in in Los Angeles.” Still, the grounds with the lush foliage, the man-made waterfalls and a couple of 18-hole golf courses are imposing.

Eileen Deardorf of Los Altos dropped by after her youngsters told her, “Mom, that place will blow your socks off.”

Said Deardorf: “The kids were right. It did blow my socks off!”

At noon, a pair of Dalmatians parade by the hotel in a dray wagon drawn by eight Clydesdales in a scene reminiscent of a Budweiser commercial.

On the limousine trip from the airport, guests freshen up with chilled towels. They are showered with leis and led to their rooms--not by Ricardo Montalban, but by employees acting out their role of fantasy islanders.

Nothing at Westin’s world comes cheap. I passed one shop displaying a $40,311 emerald-diamond sparkler. Another store displayed a gown with a five-figure price tag.

Westin’s accommodations start at $175 a day, and the best suite (baby grand piano, sauna, wet bar, spiral staircase and a lanai overlooking Nawiliwili Harbor) figures out to $1,500 a day.

Guests paddle about in Hawaii’s biggest swimming pool (complete with waterfalls, its own island and a marble eagle perched topside on a marble mountain); they dine and imbibe in 16 restaurants and lounges, including the romantic Inn On the Cliffs; they wind surf at Kalapaki Beach, play Westin’s 36-hole golf course, soak in five Jacuzzis and steam away the aches in a European-style health spa.

Opening soon will be an artisan village with gift shops one can reach by horse carriage or launch.

Like everything else, weddings in the Chapel by the Sea are pricey. The top of the line is a $1,788 package that includes an ocean-view suite (one night), flowers, champagne, photos and gifts. Meanwhile, the bride and groom are delivered in a white carriage drawn by a couple of pure white nags.

Or for $500, Westin will provide the clergy, chapel, a witness, a bouquet for the bride and a lei for the groom. Everything else is extra: the musicians, flowers, carriage, wedding cake, ad infinitum.

Staggering Overhead

If prices seem excessive, Westin can be excused. With 1,800 employees, the overhead is staggering. Just manicuring the grounds figures out to $100,000 a month. And it costs an additional $200,000 to feed, breed and stable the Clydesdales. And that, Clyde, is a lot of hay.

By now, perhaps you understand why I opted to check out the old Kauai, the one with the real lagoons, the real waterfalls, the real mountains, sweet privacy and such attractions as the one-bedroom B&B; Kirby Guyer operates on the North Shore at Kalihiwai Bay.

Guyer, who fled Los Angeles’ crowded freeways for the calm of Kauai, calls her B&B; Hale Ho’O Maha, which translates to “house of rest.”

It’s a seaside shack with great charm and a seven-foot round bed. Only 10 paces from the ocean, Hale Ho’O Maha faces a magnificent beach. Says Kirby: “The boats, gas grill, clothes washer and cable TV are all yours.”

Ironwood trees cast their shade, and there’s freshwater swimming in the Kalihiwai River that flows nearby. Maximum occupancy at Hale Ho’O Maha: two guests. Rate: a flat $40 per night, single or double.

On this search for the old Hawaii, I was thinking of the age before high-rises, tour buses and carloads of tourists, a time when traffic was sparse and cane fields obscured telephone lines, and alongside country roads, mom ‘n’ pop cafes served steaming bowls of saimin.

A Changing Place

Once, years ago, driving from the airport at Lihue to Kapaa, I passed only one other car. Now roads are becoming crowded. New hotels are taking shape. Coming soon will be a 605-room Hyatt on Keoneloa Bay near Poipu.

While Kauai is changing, marvelous moments of old Hawaii remain. I found this at the Roxy Diner and at Fast Freddy’s in Kapaa, at Banana Joe’s near Hanalei and at the little town of Hanapepe on Kauai’s West Shore.

Hanapepe sprang up in the early 1800s. As Kauai’s “biggest little town,” Hanapepe’s old-style plantation storefronts recall a moment in time when roads were unpaved and locals traded at the company store.

When business moved to Lihue, Hanapepe became the sleepy village where the action revolves around Gwinn and Sue Hamabata’s Green Garden Restaurant with its hanging plants and the fresh fish they broil over kiawe flames.

Earlier, the Green Garden was the Hamabata family’s home. Then one day the Hamabatas rolled the house on telephone poles to its new location, discarded the furniture and opened their restaurant.

Fans spin in the ceiling and seafood curry is served over rice with mango chutney. Locals will tell you it’s the best restaurant for miles around.

The Best-Kept Secret

The Green Garden is near Waimea Plantation Cottages, which without question is the best-kept secret on Kauai, this being an assembly of 18 classic old plantation homes on an immense beach that faces the island of Niihau.

Like Hamabata’s Green Garden Restaurant, the cottages were moved to Waimea after serving as shelter for workers at Kauai’s old sugar plantation. A four-bedroom, three-bath cottage with kitchen and dining room fetches $120 a night or $700 a week. And there’s the honeymoon cottage that welcomes newlyweds for a flat $80.

The rambling, two-story manager’s home (circa 1800) features five bedrooms, 3 1/2 baths, an ocean-front lanai, ceiling fans, a couple of TVs, a stereo and a VCR, the whole bundle rising on eight acres that flourish with sugar cane, bananas, papayas, coconut palms and banyan trees.

It’s available for $2,100 a week, which figures out to under $24 a day per guest. Only 30 miles from Poipu and a short drive from Kokee and the haunting Kalalau Valley, it’s the old Hawaii we’d been searching for. Hammocks are strung between trees. Sunsets are startling. How can one say aloha to all this?

In this search for old Hawaii, I avoided Kauai’s luxury hotels, choosing instead a condominium at Kapaa where, with the dawn, I was awakened by the pounding of waves. No tension, no stress, no pressure. Only the trade winds and the thunder of the ocean.

Years ago Hawaiians tended taro patches and banana and coconut plantations. Now Kapaa resembles a Hollywood set with one- and two-story buildings, mostly wooden, scattered along either side of the road.

Satisfaction Guaranteed

Locals gather to exchange gossip while others zero in on Fast Freddy’s, a funky cafe with oilcloth on the tables and a $2.22 breakfast (two pancakes, two eggs, two sausages and two strips of bacon) that’s free if you aren’t satisfied.

Fast Freddy, 39, with his huge smile, works side by side with his father, Slow Freddy, his mom Adeline (a full-blooded Hawaiian from Niihau), 2 offspring, 9 brothers and sisters, 30 nieces and nephews and his girlfriend, ex-mainlander Valerie Finn, who Fast Freddy describes as “a Hawaiian at heart.”

Lunch at Fast Freddy’s (rice, Portuguese sausage, potato salad, chicken and vegetables) will cost you less than $5, and dinner figures out to about $7. On weekends, Fast Freddy’s family shows up with ukuleles.

Because Fast Freddy has no liquor license, guests bring their own booze. Meanwhile, Slow Freddy passes out free gardenias that he grows in his garden.

Bring along a snapshot of yourself for the wall and Fast Freddy will discount your bill by 10%. Fast Freddy warns, however, that he operates on Hawaiian time, which is to say if the fish are biting he might lock up and disappear.

Down the road, other islanders gather at the Roxy Diner, which is a lunch counter surrounded by fewer than a dozen tables.

Evening of Music

When I stopped by the other night, a couple of Hawaiians from Niihau, Lani and Isaac Kamahele, played nonstop for a solid two hours. At the lunch counter a white-haired Hawaiian kept time with his knife and fork while a lovely islander serenaded the crowd.

The Roxy is possibly the happiest cafe on Kauai. Posters of James Dean, Marilyn Monroe and Flash Gordon stare down from the wall and a Coors sign hangs behind the musicians. Kids at the counter sip soft drinks, and tutus with infants in their arms join the audience.

Proprietor Dick Gregg turns out shrimp Provencal, pepper steaks and a chicken dish with mushroom caps, vegetables and Burgundy sauce that would do Chasen’s proud.

Meanwhile, the Kamahele brothers from Niihau take requests from diners.

“We do good words with good heart,” Isaac said in his pidgin English.

The Roxy was closing. It had been a day to remember, this rediscovery of the old Hawaii, a day that’s etched in the mind like the lyrics to a haunting love song, words never to be forgotten, a brief moment that spent itself too quickly but whose memory will remain like the pounding surf and the mists that crown Kauai’s magnificent mountains.

It had begun with a stunning sunrise; it ended with a tropical moon whose glow spread across the Pacific to infinity and the darkness beyond.

Note: Developer Chris Hemmeter opened another mega - resort on the Big Island of Hawaii several days ago, which will be reviewed here later this fall.