The Hawaiian gazette. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1865-1918, 1890-05-20
How to Make Honolulu Attractive to
Tourists.

How TO Make Honolulu Attractive to
Tourists.
Mr.. EDITOR: In your issue Of
Wednesday, May 18th, you point
out three obstacles to the develop
ment of tourist travel in this direc
ton, to wit: the lack of roads, of
cable communication, and of adver-
Using
The first is, no doubt, important,
and every one interested in the
prosperity of these islands, joins
you in wishing that the new Legis-
lature may do something in the
matter; as for cable communion
ten, however desirable from pro-
gressive or business point of view,
it may be doubted If the fact of
your having cable would bring a
single tourist extra to these shores,
seeing that they consist largely Of
men who have earned their leisure
and their money by hard work and
close application to business and
who, as rule, are only too glad to
escape for time from the din and
hustle of this money-making world
and its contrivances.
AS for advertising, this has, when
properly done, its value; but unless
you have something really good to
advertise, no amount of flaming
bills, or high-sounding praises, will
create a permanent demand for
anything.
But it has occurred to me that
there is another want as important,
if not more important, than that of
| roads, and that is the want of first
| class hotel accommodation, worthy
of the place.
Let it be distinctly understood
that l do not wish to criticise any
thing in the arrangements of the
only hotel that Honolulu can boast
of mean the only hotel with any
just pretensions to being first
class cosmopolitan establishment,
such as tourists expect to find in
every place they go to.
The proprietors, no doubt, do
whatever the peculiar circum-
stances of lease or tenure demand,
or permit them to do, and it is only
to be regretted that the result is
not as satisfactory as for the good
reputation of Honolulu IN this re-
spect, would be desirable.
Your remark that travellers
come where they can be made
thoroughly comfortable" is tru-
ism, and whatever the causes, it is
unfortunately fact too patent to
admit of doubt, that hitherto trav-
elers in Honolulu have not been
made quite as comfortable as they
might have been.
Fortunately the general amenity
of situation, climate and manners,
must have mitigated largely any
feeling of discomfort, and am
sure that when visitors depart,
and crowned with flowers, they
say "good bye" to Oahu's love-
ly shores, amidst strains of
sweet music, they take with
them, on the whole, pleasur-
able remembrance of these islands,
and will forgive at least, if not for
get, any inconvenience entailed On
them by the want here of certain
advantages found in the great
metropolitan hotels of the CONT
nent only.
But it must not be forgotten that
these pleasurable impressions are
less persistent IN mems minds than
disagreeable ones. A man will
grumble about a hard bed that he
slept on in hotel and remember
an indigestion a bad dinner has
caused him, for years after the soft
couch with silken coverlets on
which he slept at the house of a
Sybarite friend and the luscious re-
past he enjoyed at the table of some
modern Lucullus have faded from
his remembrance-simply because
he had to pay for the bed and the
dinner. Such is human nature
Every traveller knows that the
question of questions going the
round of the passengers on board
OF steamer, day or two before
arrival at some port of call or
place OF resort, is: " What hotel do
you stop al 2" and: What sort of
place is it 2"
This shows the Importance of an
establishment "comme il faute," if