Photo Gallery: Fun-Sized Lines at Maui’s Honolua Bay and Ho’okipa

Maui ain’t just Jaws and pumping Honolua Bay. Clearly, they are the two most recognizable waves on the island. While neither gets poster-worthy very often, they’re enough to live rent-free in most surfers’ heads.

Pulitzer Prize-winning author William Finnegan reminisced glowingly of Honolua Bay in the critically acclaimed Barbarian Days, writing, “….the wave commanded such devotion that I could see renouncing all other ambition than to surf it, every time it broke, forever.”

Matt Cibulka is a Maui-based photographer who has been shooting surf for about two years. His photos of a mid-April swell hitting Honolua and Ho’okipa aren’t the kind that will have Finnegan leaving his responsibilities behind, but they show that these waves still offer something for the everyman. Though Ho’okipa is often called the windsurfing capital of the world, there are days when one can still stay on the face. Just because Kai Lenny shows up with straps doesn’t mean the rest of us should run for the hills. 

One of his Ho’okipa sessions even had the rarest of phenomenons in Maui: an evening “glass” off.

“Ho’okipa is known to get windy from 12 a.m. to 4 p.m., and that’s when the waves turn to windsurfing,” Cibulka told me. “However after 4 p.m., the surfers start to trickle in and get some amazing sunset photos. Also, the winds were not as strong, but strong enough to help propel some airs. I think Ho’okipa [sees] more airs than most breaks because of the wind.”

Continue scrolling for Cibulka’s full gallery. You can see it on Instagram here.