Answer: Travel has always been my passion. My goal was to go to every continent by 30 and I did. I was born in the U.K.  All of our vacations were overseas, outside of the U.S. One of the problems being raised in the U.S. is it's more difficult to go overseas and travel. When you spend a lot of time in Europe, people develop a global viewpoint because it's easier for them to visit other countries. People (in the United States) have to work a lot harder to get those experiences and but it's so critical to do so.

Q: How long will you be in Hawaii?

A: As long as the Sun shines…really why would anybody leave Hawaii?

Q: You left WorldCom around the time the company's scandal was mushrooming. Any connection?

A: Completely unrelated. I was doing a master's degree and decided to do it full time. I was there for the tech boom and that was great, but sadly all was not what it seemed. There's a lot of emotion behind it. People forget this was a organization like all others and employees were hit hard by not only personal financial looses, but loss of confidence in a company they worked so hard for. It is a difficult thing to live through.

Q: How has the online hotel marketing game changed recently?

A: Hotels are making sure the user experience on the Web sort of mirrors the guest experience once they get to the property. All of our properties here in Hawaii and French Polynesia have their own Web sites where our potential guests can get a feel for the hotel. In Hawaii we feel that's very important, because it's a leisure destination, and people need more information than the distance to the airport, etc. We sort of split with the Starwood parent company over that, because they do both leisure and business.

Q: What's new with the Starwood preferred guest program?

A: Obviously Hawaii is one of the most popular destination for awards, so people are spending money with Starwood then redeeming points for a pleasure vacation, which is great. What we're finding is that the property that has the highest redemption also has significantly higher bookings. Not only are there a lot of guests redeeming awards at the Westin Maui but we're also finding that Starwood preferred guests are paying to stay at the Westin Maui. They are driving a lot of additional business at a higher rate ADR (average daily rate) than we see in other segments.

Q: Waikiki is boosting room revenue after major declines. How do you do that when Web sites are offering cheap hotel rooms?

A: One thing that we've found when we do an analysis of the rate plans that are booked, we've found that the Web plans are yielding much higher revenue than they once did. Online booking is no longer the cheap way plan a vacation; it's just the way people are booking rooms. Guests prefer to book online. So our average daily rate for Web bookings is extremely high and getting higher.