Hawaii: Four Seasons Hualalai mesmerizes with color, cuisine, great golf courses
Adam Schupak- The Four Seasons Hualalai Resort on Hawaii's Big Island hosts the PGA Tour Champions' season-opening event.
- The resort features two golf courses, including the Jack Nicklaus-designed Hualalai layout and the private Tom Weiskopf-designed Ke’olu course.
- Amenities include seven pools, multiple restaurants, a saltwater snorkeling pond, and a canoe club for members.
- The property also includes a high-end real estate community with homes ranging from condominiums to multi-million-dollar estates.
(Editor's note: Although the PGA Tour's 2026 Sentry Tournament of Champions at Kapalua was canceled, golf in Hawaii is very much alive and well. All week long, Golfweek will highlight some of the state's incredible courses and views.)
KAILUA-KONA, Hawaii — Rising from his barstool of the open-air lanai at Residences Beach Club at the Four Seasons Hualalai Resort, PGA Tour Champions President Miller Brady placed his Kona Longboard beer on the bar and pointed at the Pacific Ocean. “Look, there’s a whale spout!” he exclaimed. “It’s right in line with that palm tree.”
As another stunning sunset began to unfold on this January day in the heart of whale-watching season, Brady and I marveled at how the blue of the ocean contrasted against the white sand and the black lava fields on the North Kona Coast of the Big Island. Those weren’t the only brilliant colors on display in the distance. “Have you ever seen a green flash?” he asked.
With a quizzical look, I shook my head. As the sun sinks almost below the horizon, its upper rim appears to glow emerald-green for a fleeting moment, he explained.
“I’ve seen it,” Brady said. “Keep looking but don’t blink or you’ll miss it.”
What I wasn’t about to miss was the pro-am party at the PGA Tour Champions 2024 Mitsubishi Electric Championship. At this oceanside retreat with the scale of an ancient Hawaiian village, the Four Seasons Hualalai – conveniently situated just 10 minutes north of the Ellison Onizuka Kona International Airport and 15 miles north of the city of Kailua-Kona – has been the annual host venue of the Champions Tour’s season kick-off event since 1997. That night, at the pro-am party, I learned I would be playing in a group with Billy Andrade the next day and dined with Hall of Fame member Bernhard Langer and his family as he and the other stars of my childhood, including the legend Tom Watson, mingled with guests before taking the stage for a one-of-a-kind class picture. While I didn’t see a green flash that first night, something nearly as rare happened that day: Shortly after my flight landed, a pothole in the runway shut down the airport indefinitely. Would I be stuck here in paradise?
If I made a list of places I’d like to be stranded, the Big Island, which is twice the size of all the other Hawaiian Islands combined, might top it. Kamehameha the Great, who united the Hawaiian Islands and placed them under his rule in 1810, could have lived anywhere he wished in his newly forged kingdom. He made his home and the seat of his government on the Big Island, birthplace of surfing, some of the world’s finest coffee and iconic (and still active) volcanoes.
The king was wise. The Kona Coast is blessed with almost constant sunshine, the clearest water in the islands, some of the best beaches found anywhere and spellbinding scenery. All this still awaits visitors to the renowned “Gold Coast,” so named for the exquisite resorts and multi-million-dollar homes scattered along its 40 miles of pristine beachfront.
Although parts of Kona are very green, the coast also has black lava deserts with a stark beauty all their own. The lava from ancient volcanic flows didn’t stop Jack Nicklaus from carving out his most user-friendly design I’ve had the pleasure of playing. The Hualalai layout takes full advantage of ocean views and dramatic shoreline vistas. A lava wall splits the par-5 seventh fairway, creating a narrow opening and potentially blind second shot. The fourth and eighth holes share a contoured double green. On the par-3 12th, the green has a bunker smack in its center. The final three holes cozy up to the ocean, highlighted by the Instagram-worthy par-3 17th.
It’s the rare vacation spot where I was tempted to spend hours pounding balls. The nine-acre driving range is so expansive that it can be converted into a nine-hole par-3 course. The practice area is also the home of Golf Hale, a 3,000 square-foot instruction, practice and entertainment facility, which has become a popular hangout for good reason. Three indoor suites are tricked out with all the latest tech, such as TrackMan flight simulators, a Sam Putting Lab, video analysis and Topgolf’s Toptracer. Non-golfers, fear not: The virtual games also include football, baseball and Zombie Dodgeball.
But there are only so many hours in the day to enjoy this playground for kids of all ages. I opted for pool time. Make sure to snorkel in King’s Pond, an outdoor saltwater aquarium stocked with an underwater psychedelic dream of exotic fish, including pyramid butterfly fish, goldring surgeonfish and stripebelly pufferfish. There’s also a protected lagoon for ocean swimming and, among a multitude of options – seven in all – an adult pool designed so that its edge seems to spill directly into the sea.
All this play built an appetite. Each restaurant on property has its own personality, catering to serious foodies and casual diners alike. Miller & Lux Hualalai was the newest dining experience when I visited, curated by celebrated Food Network host/chef Tyler Florence and with views of Hualalai's 18th green.
Steps away from the ocean’s edge, Ulu Ocean Grille welcomed resort guests back for breakfast and dinner service in December following an extensive transformation. Their chefs continue to push the boundaries of flavor and sustainability, serving up what they call RSA – regional, seasonal and artisanal – cuisine under the stars by tapping more than 160 local growers for the freshest produce on the island. There’s also no better view for al fresco dining than Beach Tree, which specializes in a modern take on Italian and Mediterranean, or simply sipping on a mean mai tai while being serenaded by the surf and cooled by gentle ocean breezes.
Four Seasons Resort Hualalai pairs its own unique island charms with Four Seasons’ impeccable service, and there’s a good chance that at some point during your stay the thought will cross your mind to cash in your 401K and throw down some roots. Rob Kildow, principal broker and director of sales at Hualalai Realty since the end of 2003, has been on the opposite end of many of those phone calls with potential homeowners. Hualalai is composed of individual communities, each possessing a unique character and ambience all its own. Kildow escorted me around Hualalai’s real estate component, where an entire new season of the show “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous” could be filmed. On one block alone, there was a place that had been recently purchased for $21 million that Kildow labeled as “needing a lot of work,” and a $37 million “tear-down” looking out at the ocean was deemed “an expensive piece of lava.” To my surprise, closer to the water didn’t necessarily mean more expensive. Some of the priciest homes at Hualalai were set back from the ocean.
“Some people just have to be in the front row,” Kildow said. “But the vistas get bigger and better the higher you climb.”
We toured condos, duplexes and townhomes, and my overall impression can be summed up by saying it wouldn’t suck to live in any of these no-expense-spared retreats. The interiors skewed modern and minimalist but appointed with bold statement pieces and outfitted with the finest appliances.
Grand yet cozy. Expansive yet private. Stylish yet simple, with stunning views of Ke’olu Golf Course, a second course that is private, the Pacific Ocean and Maui in the distance.
More residences were set to break ground soon. The volunteer and employee car lot during the Mitsubishi Electric Championship was a plot of land to be converted into 12 new home sites. Kildow said there were potentially another 100 front doors to be built, including at the site of the golf maintenance facility, which would be relocated.
Like the owner in the old Hair Club for Men commercials, Kildow not only knows his product well but lives it daily professionally and personally, having purchased a villa here with his wife, Barbara, in 2001. He’s one of the few, the proud full-time residents. Most members spend anywhere from three to six months here, creating what is largely a second- and third-home community. Many of the owners populating the highest-priced regions progressed from a $4 million condominium to an $8 million townhome, and some keep going. Charles Schwab used to have a starter home here before he decided to build his own course on the island. Bob Parsons, the founder of equipment brand PXG, lives on Hualalai’s sixth hole. The joke is to aim your tee shot at his house in the distance. Which house, you ask? Take your pick, because Parsons owns all four of them.
Jay Kaiser, a homeowner and one of my pro-am partners, told me that during the recession, they were giving properties away, but since COVID, “You have to stand in line, hope something comes on the market and jump on it.” Kildow said it’s common these days for places to be snapped up before they are ever listed on the MLS, the comprehensive database of homes for sale. If the weather doesn’t close a deal – the sunny side of Kona averages eight inches of rain per year and the temperature fluctuates just six degrees between summer and winter – the amenities will.
It doesn’t take long to see why members ponied up to have their own places. In addition to the Residences Beach Club, members have access to the Hualalai Canoe Club, a casual hideaway overlooking Uluweuweu Bay just a short cart ride away (most residents spin around the community in their own carts) and offering dining options, two pools and an activity area. Expert watermen and women known as the Alaka’i Nalu, or leaders of the waves, serve as ocean ambassadors, sharing their love and knowledge of the water and life that surrounds the resort.
Members can jump on board the Alaka’i Nui (Great Leader), a 46-foot center-console catamaran for offshore fishing, snorkeling, whale watching during the season and more. A marine biologist on staff adds to the elevated experience.
And the best reason of all might be the members-only, Tom Weiskopf-designed golf course. The front nine at Ke’olu Golf Course was completed in 2002 and the back nine in 2004, and the layout underwent a refresh in 2023. Weiskopf routed the second course within the Hualalai community through the dramatic lava fields of Ka’upulehu. Each nine finishes tough with uphill holes playing into the wind, or as one staffer described it, “It’s as if Weiskopf decided to see how mean can I be?” That challenge hasn’t been a deterrent to play on the upper course, as members call it. In Kildow’s unscientific survey, he estimated members played three-quarters of their rounds at Ke’olu due to the closer proximity to home and no need for tee times. The afternoon I played it, I felt as though I had the course to myself. I’d probably play a few extra rounds there too, just to indulge in the comfort stations at Nos. 5 and 13, stocked with a full bar and all sorts of goodies from local favorite spam musubi to a cup of chicken salad or a breakfast croissant.
All good things must come to an end, and for me the news that they repaired the airport runway meant there was no built-in excuse to tell my wife that I had to extend my stay. It was time to return to reality. But not before I returned for one last sunset meal at the Residences Beach Club, nestled just beyond the Waiakauhi Pond and 18th tee box of the Hualalai Golf Course. The first food and beverage facility on property is as popular as ever with its toes-in-the-sand vibe, casual lanai dining and a diverse menu of fish tacos, signature pizzas and my favorite, the ahi poke. And it’s where on a clear day, as the sun dipped into the Pacific, the sky glowed an intense green. Good thing I didn’t blink.