Cool and quiet at 1,600 foot elevation the Cook pine trees tower over narrow streets lined with tin-roof cottages. Old style stores, two local style restaurants, banks, art gallery, a police station with a wooden jail in the yard look much like they did decades ago. Hotel Lana'i, built in the 1920's is still open with 11 quaint and comfortable guest room. A new restaurant, Henry Clay's Rotisserie, has been added. The beach lines the shore for miles, a wild and windswept strand, and a wrecked cargo ship rests on a reef in the channel between Lana'i and Maui.
Some inland rocks bear petroglyphs.
Beachcombers might find glass fishing floats or driftwood, and hardy hikers can continue eight miles north to Polihua Beach. George Munro, ranch manager at the turn of the century with great foresight, planted the ridge and the highlands with Cook Island pine trees to draw moisture from the passing clouds and provide an adequate watershed for the island. Here, rocks scorched by ancient eruptions have been bared and carved by erosion into irregular pinnacles and buttes. At sunset, the brick-red earth is washed with a spectrum of desert colors. The Native Hawaiian Dry land Forest at Kanepu'u is an area of rare plant life now under the stewardship of the Nature Conservancy.