Michael As the esteemed readership may know, during their stay in the USA, the intrepid newsletter reporters have so far only explored two of the six inhabited Hawaiian islands: Kauai, Maui, Big Island, Oahu, Lanai, and Molokai. They have yet to explore the main island of Oahu (with the capital Honolulu and Waikiki Beach) and the rather secretive Lanai, where only the super-rich and famous are supposedly vacationing. This year, we deemed it necessary to visit both islands, as we do not tolerate any blank spots on our map.

After a five-hour flight from Oakland (across the Bay from San Francisco), a small propeller plane took us from Honolulu to Lanai. Angelika had planned everything perfectly: we would rent a four-wheel-drive Jeep (incidentally, at a fantasy price that could only be enforced on a remote island) and explore the sights along the unpaved roads. We started this on the very first day by maneuvering the toy Jeep (a Jeep Wrangler) somewhat professionally over a road with partly quite deep sand to a shipwreck that had been lying offshore of a secluded beach for decades.

However, a small rain shower broke out the following night. This caught us by surprise, as it hadn't rained a drop in San Francisco since March, as is the case every year. As it turned out the next day, the water that had poured down during the night had transformed all the unpaved roads on the island into a mud fest and, in some parts, even into raging rivers that would have been navigable only with a tank, but certainly not suitable for a show-off Jeep with children's car tires. Instead of following the recommendation to return the Jeep and hang out with a book on the sofa in the hotel lounge, we put on heavy hiking boots and our Gore-Tex jackets, drove the Jeep to the trailheads, parked it, and walked hiking paths on foot.

Part of it was truly adventurous; at times, the paths were two feet underwater, so we had to hack our way through dense undergrowth for hundreds of yards to keep going. But the "Garden of the Gods," a collection of large, round stones on red sand, was really worth enduring this ordeal. In the evening, when we got back to our hotel, we certainly stood out as heroes. Besides three young people covered in a thick layer of mud with mountain bikes, we hadn't met anyone on the trail. As it later turned out, the three had just started working as waiters in one of the luxury resorts after having been recruited from Alaska. One of them mentioned that the evening before, he had served the guitarist "Slash" from the band Guns 'N Roses at the resort restaurant!

Lanai is tiny. There is an airport, two resorts, a hotel, two snack bars, and an inn that doesn't have a liquor license, which is why you can buy wine/beer at a reasonable price in one of two supermarkets and bring it with you —- it will be served at your table without any fuss. If you stay for a week, you have to eat several times at the same inn, whose menus don't even change, which quickly becomes tiresome.

With one exception, there's only typical American junk food, which you hardly find in America anymore (at least not in San Francisco). The resorts have super expensive (and I mean *much* more expensive than in San Francisco, if that tells you anything) restaurants with quite good food, but it's definitely not worth the money. The clientele consists of golf-playing snobs, mainly from the USA and Japan/Korea, all dressed the same: white shorts and polo shirts during the day, and beige slacks and shirts in the evening. The resorts are expensive ($300 a night) and tasteless. You can also rent bungalows with a butler ($2000 per night), which supposedly film stars like to do. We stayed at the "Hotel Lanai" in the "downtown" of Lanai City (estimated population of 3000) at relatively reasonable prices and laughed at the resort clowns, who were also very annoyed because the golf courses were closed due to rain!

A few days later, we tackled the "Munro Trail," an approximately 12 mile long off-road route that winds through Lanai's highest mountain range. Due to fog and rain, the magnificent views were sometimes completely nonexistent or limited to small "windows," but the path dramatically led through clouds that lingered indecisively, unable to decide whether they wanted to rain down on us or not.

In Hawaii, it seems to be quite uncommon, similar to the American mainland, to cover longer distances on foot. So, when we asked the concierge at a super-luxury resort for directions, he noticeably hesitated and implied that while he could explain the way, he couldn't take any responsibility for what might happen to us. I chalked it up to American over-cautiousness, which businesses often display to protect themselves from massive liability claims, and I laughed as I pointed to the heavy German-made hiking boots I had marched in on the elegant hotel lobby across the polished hardwood floor. However, the next day we learned from our hotel manager that the concierge had actually called and expressed concern about the two crazy hikers. Well, well, covering 12 miles on a mountainous route is no small feat, but the fitness-hardened newsletter reporters could certainly handle it!

At the end of the path stood a signpost with the inscription "Exit," which obviously pointed to the country road via an unpaved road. However, we only saw Lanai City on the horizon and chose an old plantation road that seemed to lead there. However, we hadn't anticipated that this road, made of red dust and about 30 feet wide, would branch wildly and lead around insane bends. The hilly plantation landscape, with man-high impassable weeds that had since replaced the original pineapple plants, offered no broad orientation. After trying out several forks that soon led back uphill and away from the country road in wild bends, a slight panic set in, as darkness would fall in two hours (which in Hawaii means it becomes pitch dark in an instant) and we were still about seven miles from Lanai City.

So we walked back to the "Exit" sign and followed the dusty path for about four kilometers until we reached the country road. Due to the impending darkness, we had accelerated our pace to stormtrooper marching speed and, upon reaching the highway, we exhaustedly realized that only about one car passed every five minutes, none of which stopped, even though we were hitchhiking. Finally, a small pickup truck came along, with two Asian boys about 18 years old in the cab, who promptly stopped and offered us a ride in the truck bed. They drove the five remaining miles like lightning and even swung into the semicircular hotel driveway at the end, where we jumped off, thanked them warmly, marched to our room, quickly showered, and made it to our reserved table at the fine restaurant by 7 o'clock. There, we were amazed to find out that one of the boys was working our table as a busboy!

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• More topics you might be interested in:

  	Oahu
  	Top product: "Maui Babe"
  	The record of the month
  	The Mysterous Game of Baseball
  	How we make such great pictures
  	Elections in America
  	Bush vs. Schröder