Kauai -- After The Hurricane, The Idyllic Beaches Are Empty And This Hawaiian Island Bustles With Reconstruction -- Coming Back -- But Resumption Of Full-Scale Tourism Still Months Away

LUMAHAI BEACH, Kauai - The water is blue and aqua, the surf cream, the sand golden and the towering ridges a dazzling green.

There's only one thing odd about this classic Hawaiian beach picture at the idyllic place where the movie "South Pacific" was filmed.

No people.

It is noon on a sunny Saturday, and Times photographer Greg Gilbert and I have one of the world's most beautiful places to ourselves.

Such complete solitude doesn't last more than a half-hour as a few locals come to share the lovely crescent, but it illustrates the advantage of risking a vacation soon on this hurricane- battered island.

Kauai is less crowded than it has been for more than a decade.

Greg said it reminded him of when he first visited Kauai 15 years ago, before mega-resorts and hotel hordes developed the Garden Isle.

You can tee off when whim strikes you, get a tennis court, or occupy the spa by yourself. Not to mention seeing lots of graphic evidence of the horrendous power of nature.

That's the good news for tourists following Hurricane Iniki which struck the island on Sept. 11. Here's the bad:

At Poipu Beach, complexes such as the Kiahuna Plantation condominiums are still a ghostly ruin along the ocean, repair work not yet started as insurance and financing are wrangled over.

At one unit, the hurricane's surf sheered off half a kitchen, leaving a microwave dangling and dishes still in a glass cabinet. In a neighboring unit, a bottle of Christian Brothers brandy sat forlornly on a table in a condominium living room, surrounded by storm-smashed debris.

Half the island's restaurants and two-thirds of its hotels and condominiums are temporarily closed for repairs. About 90 percent of the shops catering to tourists are also closed on the 550-square-mile island.

During our visit a week ago, just two of 10 cultural attractions, 1 of 12 boat tours, four of 16 dive shops, two of 18 tour companies and nine of 13 helicopter companies were reported open by a special "hot-line" office set up to answer tourist inquiries.

Some beaches still need to be cleaned of driftwood debris. Some trails are still closed because of fallen trees or landslides. Some state parks are closed until January, and some county beachside parks will be occupied by tent shelters at least until Jan. 1.

Most of the restaurants that are open are fast-food or modest eateries catering to locals, and are more likely to be crowded with construction workers imported from the mainland than honeymooners.

During the next year, Kauai's resorts will reopen slowly, refurbished and better than ever. As they do, the restaurants and shops will open with them.

That leaves the Kauai lover with a choice. Come soon, and trade fewer amenities and diversions for smaller crowds. Or wait six months to a year for relaxation and amusement on a scale and sophistication more typical of Hawaii.

JoAnn Yukimura, mayor of Kauai County, suggested that adventurous travelers can come now if they obtain reservations in the limited hotel space. But she said any promotion of tourism should wait until spring at the earliest.

"We ask visitors to be sensitive to the fact that the community is still recovering and there is a certain amount of stress," she said.

Kauai was declared a disaster area. Understandably its inhabitants are concentrating on putting their lives back together, dampening slightly the solicitous and festive atmosphere often found in Hawaii.

Those visitors already on Kauai are split on whether they would recommend that others follow them now.

"It's as good a time as any to come back because you do have the place to yourself," said Grace Lord of Park City, Utah, who was sunning herself on a Poipu Beach spit of sand shared only by partner Benny Buenadonna.

Others were more cautious.

"As far as tourism goes, it's beautiful, there are no crowds, and you have the beach to yourself - but there's nothing to do," said Jacqui Beal of Oceanside, Calif.

"It's real sad for me," said her husband, Dane, looking back along the Poipu Coast were scores of multi-million-dollar homes had been wrecked or literally wiped off their foundation. "I think it's too soon to enjoy the Hawaiian effect."

"What we've seen is unbelievable," Debbie Moore of Onancock, Va., said of the wreckage. "I'm really shocked."

Kauai is still so beautiful and so hard-hit, so quickly recovering and so far from finished, that no two tourists are likely to react quite the same way.

Evidence of Hurricane Iniki is still everywhere.

More than 14,000 homes were damaged and most aren't fully repaired. Four emergency dumps have been opened to hold demolition debris and will only gradually be closed and the mess transferred elsewhere. Power is back, but some of the repairs are makeshift.

The island's popular south shore, the Poipu Beach area, is the hardest hit. Major hotels including the Stouffer Waiohai, Poipu Beach, Kiahuna Plantation and the Sheraton Kauai Beachfront are unlikely to open until next fall. All suffered severe wave damage and lost some land, though Poipu Beach itself actually gained sand and is wider than before.

Landmarks such as the Beachfront Restaurant have been licked clean by waves. The road to Spouting Horn is passable but the pavement was washed out in areas, and foundations are all that's left of many luxury homes.

The east shore is in better shape. The Kauai Hilton opened to tourists last week. The nearby Kauai Resort and Coconut Beach resort are operating and slowly emptying of emergency and construction workers.

The Coco Palms Resort is closed until next summer or fall, but its famed grove of coconut palms is largely intact. That's lucky: by one estimate, it can cost $3,000 to replace a single coconut tree.

The north shore was hard hit again, with some of the worst roadside tree damage near Kilauea. Major resorts such as the Princeville Hotel and Hanalei Bay Resort are not expected to reopen until next summer.

Two of the island's huge "fantasy" resorts suffered more superficial damage and will probably open in April or May.

One is the 800-acre Westin Kauai, where landscaping was lashed, ocean breakers filled Hawaii's largest swimming pool with sand and mud, and 10 percent of the 847 rooms were damaged.

Looking a bit like a Cecil B. DeMille movie set with its pillars, pools and Asian art collection, the five-year-old complex is being refurbished at a cost estimated at $20 million.

Hotel spokeswoman Stephanie Reid has gone through four Kauai hurricanes now. "Iniki was very frightening," she said. "You can't explain what a 160 mph wind feels like. Hearing the noise was even more frightening than seeing what was happening."

But the beach in front of the resort gained sand, wildlife in the lagoons was unscathed, and the landscaping has recovered faster than expected.

"If you are a more hardy-type traveler, Kauai is ready," she said. "If you like to sit in the sun by the pool and eat in fine restaurants, wait."

The two-year-old Hyatt Regency near Poipu was high enough above the ocean that only its lower pools, landscaping and roof suffered serious damage.

Housekeepers and waiters have been rehired in landscaping teams, the roof is being retiled, and its elaborate swimming pool that switchbacks down a hillside is largely intact.

The island's scenery is already mostly restored. The post-hurricane stark brown mountainsides of stripped vegetation have been replaced with new green, though the stark white limbs of dead trees still poke out in many places.

An ironic benefit is that views from some resort hotels are better because foliage is less dense.

Forest damage is spotty, largely disappearing at elevations above 3,600 feet. Silk oaks were hard hit, but eucalyptus is bouncing back. There are angry red scars in many places as land slid during or shortly after the hurricane, exposing the volcanic soil.

Foresters expect the scars to heal swiftly, but probably with more vigorous non-native species.

George Niitani, the director of the Land and Natural Resources Department on Kauai, said the hurricane's impact on the ecosystem will probably be far more noticeable to locals than visitors in years to come.

For example, Kauai's forest had not completely recovered from 1982's Hurricane Iwa when Iniki hit in September, he noted.

"Kauai has not been as green and vegetated since 1982 as it was in the 1950s and 1960s," he said, but tourists in the past decade were probably unaware of any difference.

The Kalalau trail along the Na Pali coast probably won't reopen for a few months because of hurricane damage. While glimpses of the coast from Ha'ena State Park and the Kalalau Lookout near Waimea Canyon suggested it is as beautiful as ever, forest rangers disagreed.

"It was rather heavily damaged and I don't think the beauty of the area will recover quickly," warned Tom Telfer, district wildlife biologist.

Despite early fears, however, Telfer said he doubted the hurricane will push six endangered bird species - apapne, iiwi, amao, `o'u, akialoa and nukupu'u - closer to extinction than they already are.

Waimea Canyon appears to have suffered little damage and is as spectacular as every. However, some trails are temporarily closed because of fallen trees.

State campgrounds are not expected to reopen until sometime in January. Some reefs were damaged, but likely not severely.

The bottom line is that Kauai - the Hawaiian island that probably comes closest to the vision of Pacific Northwesterners when they imagine a tropical paradise - is still breathtakingly beautiful.

The process of its healing will be an attraction in itself.

"The scenic beauty is still here," said Paulete Brutner, an employee at the Kokee Museum in Kokee State Park. "It's amazing how fast it comes back."