These days, most visitors to the Big Island arrive via Kona International Airport at Keahole, approximately seven miles north of the popular seaside town of Kailua-Kona. While you're at the airport take the time to visit the Ellison S. Onizuka Space Center, a compact museum and "educational facility dedicated to the memory of Hawaii's first astronaut who perished aboard the Challenger Mission in 1986." Colonel Onizuka famously hailed from the town of Kealakekua on the Big Island of Hawaii.