You really don’t know what it means to get wistful about a destination until you’ve come home from Hawaii. You’ll try to put your finger on what’s triggering such an emotional response, recalling the islands’ perfect amalgam of beauty and warmth and kindness, but that’s only part of it.

Why you’ll yearn is so intangible, in a way almost private, that you’ll end up telling those who’ve never been that they just have to be there to know. The votes have been in for a long time. Hawaii is paradise.

There are many exceptional hotels in Hawaii but there is one in particular that seems to have cult status with families, Kona Village on the Big Island. One of the few inclusive-style accommodations in Hawaii, we’ve had the family-friendly hotel review on Ciao Bambino for a while now. Even though I personally interviewed the family that wrote the review, I didn’t really understand what made the hotel so special.

I do now.

Where else can you take a kid to see a real, erupting volcano?

It’s safe – Kilauea Volcano is sometimes referred to as the “drive-in volcano” – and it’s interesting. Enter the Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, located near Volcano Village, and take the 11-mile Crater Rim Drive, which circles Kilauea’s summit caldera and craters. You can see the eruption at Halema‘uma‘u Crater, learn about lava at the Jaggar Museum, peer into steam vents, smell sulphur banks, walk through Thurston Lava Tube, and hike Devastation Trail …