Lahaina, Hawaii

Arborists have already removed 22 trunks from Lahaina’s famous banyan tree, and as of early 2026 they still aren’t certain it will fully survive. The tree, planted in 1873 and grown into a canopy that once shaded nearly two-thirds of an acre in the center of town, was badly burned in the August 2023 wildfire that tore through Lahaina and destroyed roughly 2,200 structures, including almost the entire historic Front Street commercial core. In the months after the fire, new leaves on the banyan were widely reported as a symbol of the town’s resilience. That optimism turned out to be premature: fungus discovered inside a branch that snapped in early 2026 suggests burn damage is still working its way through the tree’s interior, and a volunteer group called Treecovery continues to inject compost tea into the surrounding soil and prune dead growth to try to keep it alive. Banyan Tree Park itself remains closed to the public while that work continues, so do not plan a visit around walking beneath it, however iconic the photos you’ve seen may be.

This is worth sitting with before anything else, because Lahaina’s history is precisely what makes the loss so significant. This was the actual capital of the Hawaiian Kingdom from 1820 to 1845, chosen by King Kamehameha II, predating Honolulu’s rise to that role. It later became one of the busiest whaling ports in the Pacific, with the number of ships calling there climbing from around 100 a year in 1824 to more than 400 a year by the 1850s, at times surpassing Honolulu itself. The town’s 1962 National Historic District designation protected roughly 60 sites tied to that royal and whaling-era history, an unusually dense concentration for a town this size, and a large share of that built heritage burned in 2023.

As of March 2026, Maui County had issued 552 rebuilding permits with only 159 homes completed, which gives a realistic sense of how far along the physical recovery actually is: still early, still slow, still very much in progress. Lahaina Harbor has reopened to longtime ocean-based operators, including sailing charters, submarine tours, and fishing companies that had operated out of it for decades, and that reopening matters because it lets some of the town’s oldest tourism businesses get back on the water rather than closing permanently. A handful of restaurants and shops outside the burn zone are open and actively want visitors, since tourist spending is one of the more direct ways outside money reaches a local economy that lost its commercial center overnight.

If you’re visiting Maui in 2026 and considering a stop in Lahaina, the honest advice is to think about why you’re going before you go. This isn’t disaster tourism territory, and it shouldn’t be treated as a curiosity stop on a Maui itinerary. Roadside memorials near the town’s entrance mark where residents lost their lives, and photographing damaged property, memorial sites, or people in the middle of rebuilding their homes is not acceptable, regardless of how well intentioned the impulse might be. What genuinely helps is spending money at the local businesses that have reopened, booking with the harbor operators that have resumed sailing and fishing trips, and giving residential neighborhoods still under construction the same privacy you’d want if it were your own street. My own view, after reading through where recovery actually stands, is that this is a town better visited a year or two from now, once more of the historic core has been rebuilt and the community has had more room to grieve without an audience. If you do go now, go to support, not to see what’s left.