Gecko is a tiki carver, artist, and mug maker based out of Honolulu, Hawaii.

Previously, Gecko'z studio space was just his garage and backyard space where he made his tiki carvings and ceramics. As of 2021, Gecko has created a polished showplace in that same studio space for visitors to admire his work...and maybe purchase pieces straight from the artist.

This studio is not open to unannounced walk-in visits. You must call or contact him ahead of time.

Established in 1984.

"Malahini" translates to "stranger" or "newcomer" in Hawaiian. However, despite the Hawaiian name and several Hawaiian touches, this is primarily a Chinese Restaurant. It is located in a strip mall and the interior's white drop ceiling, white walls, and green glass pub shades over the bar do little to enhance the island feeling either. However, it does have some nice touches, including some vintage Orchids of Hawaii swag lamps, some tiki masks on the walls, and several frosted glass panels that show palm trees and other island images.

Their website and current menu does not include a cocktail list.

Beach passed away in Honolulu, Hawaii, in June 1989, at the age of 81.

He is known for starting Don the Beachcomber during the 1930s in Hollywood, California, which was expanded to a chain of dozens of restaurants throughout the United States. He later built the International Market Place and additional establishments in what was then the Territory of Hawaii.

Beach is also generally credited with establishing the entire tiki drink genre. He created dozens of recipes such as the Zombie, the Cobra's Fang, Tahitian Rum Punch, Three Dots and a Dash, Navy Grog, and many others.

He was an Army colonel during WWII and is buried in buried in Section B Site 1-C of The National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu.

Pier 7 was located at the Ilikai which opened in February of 1964.

Pier 7 was a 24-hour coffeehouse restaurant for after-show, after-movie, after-shopping grinds. Or breakfast. Or lunch. Or dinner. But after hours was the time you’d see all the headlining entertainers after their last shows. This made Pier 7 a big draw for those hoping to get a candid look at Hawaiian entertainers. Although Pier 7 eventually closed, the Ilikai Hotel endures.

*NOTE: Vintage cocktail menu below seems to have covered several locations within the Ilikai Hotel, not just one.

In 1967, CBS paid for two television pilots based in Hawai'i. One was picked up, the other was not. One was Hawaii Five-O starring Jack Lord, the other was Kona Coast starring Richard Boone. I'm sure I don't have to tell you, but just in case: Hawaii Five-O was the one that went on to glory, while Kona Coast was destined to be completely unknown.

But Warner Bros, producer of Kona Coast, chose to recoup their costs by releasing Kona Coast as a film. It still is pretty darned obscure, it barely made a squeak when it came out in 1968. But -- and let's give thanks for this right now -- for some oddball reason, Warner Bros decided to release Kona Coast on a very bare-bones DVD. Now you can see this terrible, wonderful show/movie. It's full of fantastic '60s Hawaiian fashion, scenes of the gritty side of Waikiki, and scenes of Kailua-Kona on the Big Island.

Which brings us to Akamai Barnes. Akamai Barnes was a tiki bar, named for a Donn Beach-type character in Kona Coast, that was one of the main sets for the show, and was right on the main drag of town. Richard Boone was not just the star of Kona Coast, he was a driving force behind the project. Since the hope was that this would get picked up as a series, Akamai Barnes was open and operated as a real bar. A US Navy sailor who visited Kailua-Kona in June 1967 on the USS Tiru reports an evening spent at the bar; Richard Boone and the cast of Kona Coast were there, along with actors Lee Marvin and Jonathan Winters (who were not in the film; Lee Marvin and Richard Boone owned a charter boat together in Kailua-Kona).

After the shoot was finished, it must have been operating for some months before word came that it wouldn't be needed for the series after all. Richard Boone continued to live in Hawai'i, and kept Akamai Barnes running. A June 1968 article in Playboy references Akamai Barnes, calling it "one of the liveliest bars in the Pacific." Per an interview with a musician of the era in Kailua-Kona, he performed at Akamai Barnes for around five years, starting when it first opened.

Looking at scenes from Kona Coast and comparing them to Alii Drive today, it appears that the spot that held Akamai Barnes is now a vacant lot.

Okolemaluna Tiki Lounge opened in November 2010, and closed in September 2012. (Okole maluna is Hawaiian for "bottoms up"; the Hawaiian "cheers".) Owners Brice and Lisa Ginardi put the focus solidly on the quality of the cocktails, serving classic tiki recipes made with locally-sourced fresh ingredients. As any cocktail lover who has visited Hawaii can tell you, this was a huge boon, a respite from the over-sweet, over-chemical drinks found everywhere in the islands. Okolemaluna's menu had about twenty cocktails, a mix of historic tiki cocktails from the great Polynesian palaces, and some new creations. The menu also had a small selection of pupus.

If you finished the entire drink menu, you could join the Okolemaluna Mug Club: you got your own custom mug kept on a special shelf behind the bar.

Beyond the drinks, Okolemaluna also sought to set a historic tone with the environment. The music was a mix of vintage and modern Exotica, and the space was filled with bamboo and lauhala matting. There was a lava rock waterfall, and some decor from defunct tiki bars.

Bruce T. Marston was a Californian serving in Tahiti as a Lt. Colonel in the U.S. Air Force. There, he met Louise, who was from Tubuai, just south of Tahiti. They fell in love, and moved to the town of Hanalei on the north side of the island of Kauai in Hawaii. There, in 1963, they opened Tahiti Nui.

Tahiti Nui became the go-to gathering place for Kauai's north shore, with musicians, hula dancing, and occasional singing from "Auntie Louise" Marston herself. Louise passed away in 2003, and Tahiti Nui is now run by Bruce and Louise's son, Christian.

Tahiti Nui makes an appearance in the 2011 film The Descendants.

The restaurant serves a mix of Hawaiian seafood standards and Italian food. The drink menu is limited, but they do have their own Mai Tai recipe, which they've been serving since they first opened. They still have live music and hula dancing.

The walls are lined with lauhala matting and bamboo, with Oceanic art pieces hanging here and there. The small round tabletops are painted with Polynesian designs, and the barstools are carved tikis. There is a small curio shop attached to the restaurant.

Don the Beachcomber is located within the Royal Kona Resort, where it opened in 2005.

This location is not to be confused with the historic, long-gone Don the Beachcomber restaurants run by Donn Beach or his partner Sunny Sund, but rather was opened by someone who picked up the rights to the name here in the Hawaiian Islands. Mainland rights to the Don the Beachcomber name are currently held by the newer Don the Beachcomber chain (including Madeira Beach and others run by 23 Restaurant Services after they acquired the brand from Delia Snyder).

The bar and restaurant are open-air, overlooking the ocean, but sheltered by a large, round roof. The restaurant in particular is full of fantastic '70s-chic Tiki loveliness, thanks to architect George "Pete" Wimberly.

A vibraphonist can sometimes be found playing in the bar as the sun sets over the ocean.

Food is on the more upscale end of Kailua-Kona dining.

The Tahitian Lanai, and its Papeete Bar, were located in the Waikikian Hotel, right on the beach at Waikiki on Oahu. They opened on October 1, 1956. Spence Weaver, of Spencecliff Restaurants, operated the restaurant, and Bob Bryant, founder of Tiki Bob's in San Francisco, was hired to manage the restaurant.

Bob Bryant said of the Waikikian and Tahitian Lanai, "Before leaving the Mainland for the first time, everybody has his own dream of what Hawaii and Tahiti will be like. In designing this hotel-restaurant complex, we tried to fulfill those ideas. We tried to make this a 'dream Tahiti' instead of just a duplicate of the real island."

The restaurant housed 40 tikis, including a large Marquesan that was purported to be at least 200 years old, and a number of black velvet Leeteg paintings.

Diners could sit poolside surrounded by tiki torches, in private huts named after Tahitian Royalty (like the Queen Pōmare IV Hut or Prince Hinoi Hut), or in the main dining room.

The Waikikian closed in 1996, and the items from the hotel and restaurant were sold in an auction that took place at the Tahitian Lanai.

The Waikikian Hotel, right on the beach & lagoon at Waikiki, was a long-time touristy institution on Oahu. The Waikikian housed the Tahitian Lanai restaurant and Papeete Bar; all three opened in 1956.

The hotel is instantly recognized by its unusual lobby, a dramatically stylized A-frame fashioned from a massive hyperbolic paraboloid, designed by architect Pete Wimberley. Much of the decorative carving and other touches were from Edward Brownlee. The grounds also included tiki-spotted gardens, and the lobby housed a gallery of black velvet Leeteg paintings.

The Waikikian closed in 1996; in December 2008, a 38-story timeshare opened in its place as part of the nearby Hilton Hawaiian Village complex. The new tower is called the "Grand Waikikian."

In 1928 the Kona Inn was built by the Inter-Island Steam Navigation Company. This venture was considered to be a pioneering effort in the neighbor island hotel industry. Previous to the Kona Inn, the passengers aboard the company steamers had only haphazard room arrangements at outlying stops.

The rambling 2-story Hawaiian structure, carefully designed to blend with the Palm fringed Kona shore, found its 20 rooms booked solidly for months in advance. The Kona Inn became Hawaii’s favorite refuge for kamaainas as well as the world traveler. The new hostelry was responsible for the popularity of the colorful Kona Coast.

The Inn was also instrumental in developing the Kona Coast as one of the world's greatest fishing areas. With the Inn as unofficial billfish tournament headquarters, the place attracted marlin fishermen from all over the globe.

It was a celebrity hideaway in the 40s and 50s.

Although the hotel has been closed now for well over 30 years. The hotel's restaurant of the same name is still open (as of 2021) and a great place to sit and watch the sunset. The shopping area of the hotel is also open. The hotel rooms are used for storage and offices.

*NOTE: Cocktail menu is current as of 2024.

Popular restaurant in the International Marketplace, owned by Hawaiian surfing legend Duke Kahanamoku. The restaurant hosted many regular musical acts, including Martin Denny and Don Ho.

*NOTE: Small standing menu below in last photo is signed by Zulu 5, the original Hawaii 5-O.

This location may be gone, but currently, as of 2021, there is also a Duke's chain of restaurants that carry on this tradition with 3 locations in the Hawaiian Islands -- Waikiki, Maui, and Kauai. They also have 3 on the Mainland -- Huntington Beach, La Jolla, and Malibu.