Keokea Homesteaders Host Innaugural Hoʻolauleʻa, Aug. 30

Keokea vantage mauka, photo by Wendy Osher.

By Maui Now Staff

An inaugural Keokea Hoʻolauleʻa is planned later this month from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Saturday, Aug. 30, 2014, at the Keokea homesteads.

The event will feature more than five dozen booths showcasing isle-produced foods, fresh produce, crafts and crops.

Produce will include Chinese long squash, and gigantic zucchini cultivated at the Kahikinui homestead. Leaders of the nine Valley Isle homesteads will also unveil a raised-bed garden project, designed to benefit Maui communities.

All-day entertainment features performances by Nā Hōkū Pā of Oʻahu, whose members’ parents are Keokea farmers.

For keiki, there will be a play area set up that will include ʻulu maika, or Hawaiian bowling.

The Labor Day weekend event is sponsored by the nonprofit Keokea Homestead Farm Lots Association.

It will be held at the Keokea homestead, located at the 16.9 mile marker of Kula Highway at Kaʻamana Street. The site is two-tenths of a mile past Grandma’s Coffeehouse in Keokea town.

Keokea vantage to West Maui. Photo by Wendy Osher.

Maui’s lone agricultural homestead at Keokea started with lot selection about three decades ago, in 1986.

Infrastructure was completed five years ago, in 2009.

Today, Keokea is starting a chapter combining sustainable, subsistence farming with economic self-sufficiency.

Organizers of the hoʻolauleʻa event envision the festivities evolving into a twice-a-month marketplace that replicates the successful Makuʻu Farmers Market operated by Hilo-area homesteaders.