HANALEI — The Hanalei Canoe Club’s 2021 Ha‘ena to Hanalei fundraiser run has been canceled, the third cancellation since the 2018 April floods in Hanalei.
Hanalei Canoe Club Steering Committee member Nancy Williams said her club had to cancel the event in 2020 because of COVID-19, and now because of the recent Hanalei landslide.
The club does not want anyone to get hurt, and doesn’t want to bring stress onto any North Shore residents, because this event is normally a big event that hosts up to 400 runners and requires a lot of work, including acquiring permits, she said.
“It’s one of our favorite and most beloved fundraisers of the year,” Williams said. “We’ve had it for over 40 years. While it is a fundraiser for our clubs, people travel from all over the world and schedule their vacations to Hawai‘i around our run. They love it so much. Not very often they close the road and let just runners have it.”
Williams said the course is eight miles from Ke‘e Beach in Ha‘ena State Park, ending at the Hanalei Pier. There is usually have a 5k course and one-mile run for the keiki.
The fundraiser benefits the Hanalei Canoe Club, a nonprofit organization that’s part of the Hanalei Hawaiian Civic Club. And Williams said canoe-racing is the cultural activity of the Hanalei Hawaiian Civic Club.
“We have a youth program that supports our North Shore keiki paddling, and when we have state races, especially when they’re off-island,” Williams said. “Much of our fundraising efforts go to pay for our keiki to go to state races. And then, of course, some of it goes to club support as well — equipment and canoes.
The next Hanalei Canoe Club fundraiser will also be canceled in the summer.
“Sadly, our next big fundraiser after that is our lu‘au, which always happens the third weekend in July,” Williams said. “And we’ve also made the decision to cancel that for all of the same reasons. And so, for now, we don’t have anything fundraising-wise on the books until hopefully next year, when we’ll be able to do both.”
“We just want to thank the community for all of their support,” Williams said. “We didn’t make this decision lightly. And as soon as we can be back out there racing and paddling and having our run, we will be there.”
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Stephanie Shinno, education and business reporter, can be reached at 245-0424 or sshinno@thegardenisland.com.
