At one end of Lahaina's a bustling Front Street, after the quaint whaling-era wooden facades with their clutter of art galleries, trinket shops and burger joints, a quiet County baseball field and parking lot lie framed by the blue-green folds of distant Kaua'ula valley. Across the street, in a two-story commercial center fronting the Bay, the Office of the Friends of Moku'ula is humming with activity. Mahina Martin, the Friends program director, juggles an interview, a group of students trickling in on a United Nations cultural-education program, and the executive director Akoni Akana's periodic phone calls on a cellular (he's stuck in bottleneck traffic on the way from Kahului).

On the wall above Martin hangs a large oil painting depicting an ancient Hawaiian scene. In it, the same green backdrop of Kaua'ula overlooks not a baseball diamond, but a wide pond bordered by palm trees and taro patches. At its center lies an island dotted with several grass hale: Moku'ula, the namesake of this small nonprofit Hawaiian organization.

Suddenly, Akana arrives and everyone files into a narrow classroom at the back of the office. Without warning, this light, sandy-haired man opens his mouth and a Hawaiian chant of welcoming booms throughout the room. His eyes are closed, his hands outstretched, riveting the audience with Maui's ancient history and the story of the treasure buried beneath red dirt and asphalt across the street.

The small island of Moku'ula once rose out of a 15-acre freshwater fish pond named Loko O Mokuhinia. Its depths were home to Kihawahine, a legendary mo'o (lizard) 'aumakua and guardian goddess of the lake. Kihawahine shared the lineage of the high chief Pi'ilani, a famous 16th century ali'i and established his royal residence at Moku'ula.

The ensuing line of Maui's royalty followed suit and Moku'ula developed into the spiritual and cultural center of the island. The presence of Kihawahine was said to augment the wealth of the land and its people, and hundreds of years later, Kamehameha I sought supernatural aid from the goddess while unifying the Hawaiian archipelago. He eventually look two daughters from the prestigious Pi'ilani lineage as wives, and his son by one of them, Kauikeauoli (known as Kamehameha III), would eventually retreat to Moku'ula to live out the dying days of the Hawaiian monarchy in seclusion.

In the mid 19th century, the kingdom's capital was moved from sleepy Lahaina to the growing commercial center of Honolulu. Several decades later the Moku'ula wetlands, once hailed as "the Venice of the Pacific" had deteriorated into a stagnant and swampy health hazard, as most of the water was diverted for sugarcane plantations.

Around this time Princess Bernice Pauahi Bishop had a premonitory dream foretelling Moku'ula's demise and hastily arranged to have some of her family's remains moved to nearby Waiola churchyard. Soon afterwards, local authorities filled the swamp in, while a harbor was being dredged for Lahaina's maritime trade. In 1914 the area was converted into a county park, and by the end of this century most knowledge of its illustrious history had been buried as well.

Nearly 100 years later, the Ka'anapali Beach Hotel initiated a cultural interpretation program that spurred Akoni Akana, among others, to research Lahaina's past. Piecing together fragments of old chants an oral histories, a grass-roots effort to rediscover the site was set in motion. To everyone's surprise, the baseball field and parking lot were identified as the location of the former pond, and in 1982 the Friends obtained funds for an archaeological study.

The Bishop Museum conducted preliminary research that brought to the area's immense historical significance to light, and an archaeological assessment confirmed that much of the original site, including rock wall perimeters and even the ahu — the mound that once marked the boundary of the ahupua'a, lay intact below ground. The realization was dawning that, for decades, one of Hawaii's most important cultural, political and spiritual centers had been hovering dangerously close to the vacuum of collective amnesia.

Galvanized by these discoveries, the Friends of Moku'ula began the long battle to bring it all back. The organization is primarily committed to restoring the Native Hawaiian community's identity and integrity, but its approach is spiritually and culturally guided, not overtly political.

"These are changing times for all of Hawaii, socially, culturally and philosophically," says Mahina Martin. "For Kamehameha III, Moku'ula allowed a return to the old times and places, it served as a center for spirituality and life style during a time of changes. In today's world there is also the challenge of restoring and retaining what once was, and again we need to go back to the spiritual and economic needs of Hawaii's people."

Akana and Martin give the impression of being driven, almost possessed in fact, by the spirit of this place. Their luck, whether in being donated valuable office space just across the street or in leveraging over $1 million toward their goals, is admittedly uncanny. "We've been incredibly fortunate, almost at a profound level," notes Martin. "Mana just emanates from it all, this whole thing has a life of its own and we often feel that it's not us in the driver's seat, we're just passengers with a wide open view."

Despite the endless work and frantic fund-raising of a grassroots effort somewhat out of place in Lahaina's gaudy, transient community, the organization has been quietly but passionately working for a decade to restore Moku'ula to its former glory. They are also planning a Hawaiian heritage site where visitors will learn about Hawaiian history and where Native Hawaiian practitioners will be able to showcase their knowledge or arts. When the area is eventually restored, the island of Moku'ula itself will nevertheless remain kapu, off-limits to the general public in deference to its status as a wahi pana — a legendary place.

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