Koala Ranch
Going to Hawaii? Love Lost? Thought Jurassic Park should have won a best picture Oscar? Don’t feel like hiking, but want to see the places you would if you weren’t a lard ass? Then one place you might want to check out if you’re on Oahu is Kualoa Ranch.
It’s a tourist trap, no need in pretending it’s not; and it’s definitely the kind of place you roll up to with grandma and the kids, but it’s fun and worth checking out if you’re in the area.
After a week of kayaking, hiking, snorkeling, swimming and driving all over Oahu, my ex and I wanted to do something chill on our final day on the island so we decided to visit the ranch to check out their “Movie Sites & Ranch Tour.”
This particular tour is lax. So much so the only physical energy we exerted was boarding a hippied out school bus that drove us around the ranch’s famed KaÊ»aÊ»awa Valley. I’m sure some of you Lost addicts probably recognize the valley as the same one Shepherd and his companions hit golf balls in on ABC’s hit TV show, and you Jurassic Park fans probably recognize the tree stump that little Tim and Lex hid behind in the first movie during a dinosaur stampede.
The bus also drives you around Hawai’i largest outdoor backlot showing you other locations used for
Adam Sandler’s 50 First Dates, Ben Affleck’s Pearl Harbor and Dwayne Johnson’s Journey 2: The Mysterious Land. There’s even a brief stop at a bunker built into the side of one of the mountains during World War II.
The tour only set us back $24.00 each, which by the end of our trip was all we wanted to spend. But for adventruous types, there is an ATV tour and horseback riding trip, just don’t expect anything more than a light trot. There’s also some water sports at “Secret Island Beach,” and a narrated hike through the lush HakipuÊ»u Valley. You can check out all of the different tours by clicking here.
And of course there’s the view … which I mean … really … is worth the drive, tourists and uneventful horse, ATV or bus ride just to check out.
