Maui Revealed: The Ultimate Guidebook (Maui Revealed)

You can not go wrong with this guidebook in Maui. We just returned from the island and we have both mentioned how valuable this guidebook was. While we were there, we commented multiple times that the authors must have been reading our minds when composing their reviews! In fact, we stayed in Oahu for two days at the conclusion of our trip and felt somewhat lost with out the guidebook for that island. Way to go! Beats Lonely Planet and even Fodors any day.

I purchased this book based on reviews from other websites to read for more info on Maui. So far, very informative and hope to see how much it will help on my upcoming trip.

In my opinion, this is the best of the best. A well laid out guide book, with lots of good iinformation.

This book is the best! Very honest and specific. I have purchased this as gift for a friend going to Maui for their honeymoon. I gave it to them a few months early so they could read thru it. Maps and directions are awesome too!

After visiting the island a few times, I met the author of this book at a book convention and became intrigued with his insights. And, after visiting the island numerous times since getting this book, I'd say it's the best thing available for finding out what Maui has to offer.

The restaurant reviews and other recommendations in this book are usually spot on, and the tips and hints about special sights to see--as well as the history of various locales--make the book invaluable.

I especially love the honesty about what is NOT good. Most of the other review books put a sugar-coating on every restaurant and every activity mentioned in their books. As a result, those books read more like advertisements than reviews. Fodor's is one example of this - don't even waste your money on its sugary-sweet "everything is wonderful" hype.

That said, I have to agree with many of the other reviews that critique Maui Revealed for its vagueness and perhaps (unintentionally) misleading descriptions about the ease of accessing some of the "off the beaten path" hikes.

The author of this book is a physically fit individual, so when the text says "a relatively easy hike," he's talking about it from his perspective. Unfortunately, I've seen relatively frail-looking people in their 50's and 60's who were trying to access some of these "relatively easy" hikes. At least one review on this book mentions tourists getting medivac'd to a hospital every few weeks as a result of trying to visit some of the sites this book recommends. Although I've not witnessed that, I can certainly see how it could happen.

Along these lines, keep in mind that the 'off the beaten path' walks recommended in this book are just that - off the beaten path. While you'll see this blue book on the dashboard of many cars, a lot of the places that require a short hike are not set up for tourists at all. No hand railings. No paved paths. In some places if you slip and fall you could end up falling a long way.

My advice: Take the author's physically fit athleticism into account when reading this, and evaluate each location with your own sense of what's safe for you and what's not. Just because the author says it's easy doesn't mean it will be easy for everyone.

Additionally, I also agree with the observation that details on how to access some of these hikes are vague. On more than one occasion I and the people I was with gave up and turned around because nothing we were seeing was like anything described in the book.

For all this critique, I still think this book is the best available for learning where to go / where not to go on Maui. If for no other reason, get this book to learn about the island's history. For example, you can drive past a non-descript location a dozen times and not think anything of it. But in Maui Revealed you might learn that some famous event occurred at that site more than 100 years ago. It's those kind of golden nuggets that set the book apart from the standard tourist publications, which are mainly focused on getting you to spend money in a particular location.

Bottom line, if you're going to Maui - or even if you've been there before - this is the one book I recommend you have with you. You'll need to engage your common sense, but you'll probably have a much more fulfilling trip from the insights and tips this book provides.