What is Sherwood Forest?

 

Sherwood Forest is a large beachside wooded area located in Waimanalo, Hawaii. The location and size of Sherwood Forest make it a rarity: the last remaining forested area of its size that continues along a beach (without a street or highway separating it from the coastline) on all of Oahu.

 

According to Robert Stone, author of Day Hikes on Oahu, Sherwood Forest “is a rolling parkland with a heavily wooded ironwood forest… bordered by Puha Stream and Bellows Air Force Base on the north and Aloiloi Street to the south.” (Stone is presumably describing the area that stretches between Kalanianaole Highway on the west and the beach on the east.) The Sherwood Forest area has sometimes also been referred to as Waimanalo Bay State Recreation Park, and is typically assumed to include Waimanalo Bay Beach Park. There is no precise boundary to Sherwood Forest; the perimeters of the area are often defined loosely. By some interpretations, Sherwood Forest extends into parts of what is commonly referred to as the Bellows area. By most delineations, Sherwood Forest is on average nearly a mile long and approximately a half mile wide, comprising roughly 300 acres.