Big Wind Kite Factory and Kite Flying on Dixie Maru

“Throw your dreams into space like a kite, and you do not know what it will bring back, a new life, a new friend, a new love, a new country.” -Anaïs Nin

I hope that I will always be able to call to mind the wonder on Caleb’s face as the wind carried his kite higher above poker the red sands of Dixie Maru beach on Moloka’i’s westernmost shore. At four years of age, our sweet boy has flown kites along Kachemak Bay in Alaska and on two islands in the Hawaiian archipelago. This, by far, is his favorite kite and it’s easy to see why.

Maunaloa’s  Big Wind Kite Factory was my favorite shop on the entire island. I could have spent an entire day flipping through the back room’s collection of books, touching all of the artisan pieces from the owner’s pilgrimages to Bali, and the stunning colorful handmade kites. Each kite is cut using a wood burning tool to cauterize the edge. The cauterizing is done by hand and only one kite is handled at a time.

Next to the kite factory is the Plantation Gallery & Blue Monkey shop, which are in the same building as the kite factory and owned by the same couple. I confess, I plan on going to Bali one day and buying souvenirs while there so the gift shop wares (while spectacular) didn’t tempt me. I loved the back room book store though. There were rare books stacked about and intermixed with paperback novels from the late 1970s. In a matter of fifteen minutes, I’d gathered a stack to purchase. 

I think it was probably about this time that Caleb finished selecting his kite and begged to leave for the beach. Thinking that I’d likely come back again before the end of our vacation, I set the books down and hopped in the car. We never returned to Moanaloa and that’s okay because the memories made in the hours that followed are so dear to my heart, so impossibly precious… who could find anything to regret in this?

When the winds kicked up again, the boys placed the kite in the car for safekeeping and explored the cove, which we had entirely to ourselves. While it’s tempting to wax on about the simple stark raw pure loveliness of this place, the images speak for themselves.