Our Story
It started with a question in church
Leon Fabricius had guided visitors around the Big Island for the better part of two decades when a new family showed up at his church in Kona. The father looked familiar. Leon leaned over and asked what half the congregation was wondering: "Are you the Bucket List Family?" He wasn't. Evan Teshima was a software founder from Utah who had just sold the company he built, foreUP, and moved his wife and four kids to Hawaiʻi for a year of surfing, homeschooling and not thinking about work. That question started a friendship. Miexia's father invited the Teshimas surfing after the service. Miexia gave the lesson. A few days later the family was at a backyard barbecue at the home Leon shares with Miexia's sister, eating like locals and listening to stories that don't appear in any guidebook.
The incognito year
For most of the next year, Leon and Miexia had no idea who Evan was. He was the friend who worked from home. They took his family to Waipiʻo Valley, to waterfalls, to beaches that don't have names on the map. They did what people raised on these islands do with people they like: they shared the place. What Evan noticed was simpler than any business idea. Every tour his family paid for was led by someone who had arrived from the mainland a year earlier and was reading from a script. Every afternoon with Leon and Miexia was led by people who had lived the stories they told.
The $3,500 bill
The business surfaced the day Evan booked a private catamaran for his family and saw the invoice: $3,500. Guests were paying premium prices for experiences built on local knowledge, and almost none of that money reached the people who held the knowledge. Leon and Miexia were two of the most experienced guides on the island, and they didn't own a share of anything they'd helped build. So Evan proposed something different. Not a job. A company the guides would own.
A company the guides own
Ohana Tours was built on one rule: the person driving the van owns a piece of the company. Leon and Miexia are partners, not employees. Evan put up the money and stays in the background; they run the tours, the vans, the days. "I saw the difference between someone doing a job and someone sharing their life," Evan says. "Leon and Miexia are anchors on this island. We wanted a model where the value stays with the families who hold the stories."
Who's driving
Miexia is Native Hawaiian, born and raised on Hawaiʻi Island, and a U.S. military veteran. Guests tend to misspell his name (it's pronounced "Misha"); nobody forgets the day. Leon was born in Samoa and has guided on the Big Island for more than twenty years. He is "Cousin Leon" to a few hundred former guests who still write to him. Together they are the reason Ohana Tours is rated 5.0 on Tripadvisor and 5.0 on Google, and ranked #2 of 322 Tours & Activities in Kailua-Kona.
What you get
One luxury 14-seat Mercedes Sprinter. One owner at the wheel. The whole island in a day — Kīlauea and Volcanoes National Park, Punaluʻu black sand beach, ʻAkaka Falls, the Hāmākua Coast, Kona coffee — with pickup at your hotel in Kona or Waikoloa and a restroom at every stop. We run through storms when the roads allow and tell you honestly when they don't. We'd rather you book with us directly than through a platform, because that's how the value stays here. Come as a visitor. Leave as ohana.