"We definitely put back into the other restaurants, that's for sure," the 28-year-old Kaimuki resident said. "Now we can go to restaurants, have a few drinks, whereas before it was, like, no way. Before, I was just working to pay my rent and my bills. But now I can actually go out and enjoy the benefits of hard work."

"If it wasn't for more money from tourists, I wouldn't be able to afford it," said Lankford, 28, adding that his co-worker just bought a new car.

"Now I eat out a lot," she said.

"We talk to each other and we're just amazed because we've never seen numbers like this — not just the amount of people coming into the hotel, but the rates that they've been paying," said the 33-year-old 'Ewa resident.

"Last month, October, we were really high in occupancy, and that's not normal. When we get into September and October, we notice the numbers kind of dip down, but it hasn't shown that this year.

"And I noticed with my other friends, they say, 'Yeah, we haven't gone down, either.' I remember one of them was saying in October, 'I have to call another hotel to find out where I can relocate my guests because we're oversold.' "

"Long hours, it kind of wears you out," the 43-year-old Punchbowl resident said. But because he also makes more money, "it's worthwhile," he said.

But while most in the visitor industry appear to be doing well, some say they don't feel they're benefiting.

The record numbers mean nothing to Kapua Medeiros, a fourth-generation lei maker at Aunty Bella's Lei Stand, a family business. The lei stand relocated from the corner of Lewers Street and Don Ho Lane to Kalakaua Avenue in front of the Royal Hawaiian Shopping Center, and business started to slow after Outrigger began its Beach Walk project construction, she said.

"It's mighty slow, very slow," she said. "With all this construction, it's killing us. I don't know how they can say it's booming. It's not booming."

The union representing hotel and restaurant employees, Unite Here, Local 5, has also said many in the industry still work two jobs to help make ends meet and that hotels need to hire more people to ease the increased workload on employees.

Hotels say low unemployment levels have made it difficult to fill vacancies.

Some communities, such as the North Shore and Kailua, feel the impact of the added visitors.

North Shore residents have been dealing with traffic congestion during the big winter-surf season. The area has become more popular than ever with tourists not only during the winter, but in the summer as well, thanks in part to increased media exposure.

Crowds of visitors this summer flocked to Laniakea Beach, also known as Turtle Beach, to see the turtles lounging there. The throngs generated concerns about traffic and safety. While many on the North Shore welcome tourists and recognize their importance to the local economy, at least some residents have raised concerns about how many visitors the community and its infrastructure can handle.

An even more heated issue is the growth of vacation rentals in coastal, residential communities such as the North Shore and Kailua. Vacation rentals have been a sore point with at least some residents, who say the proliferation of those units brings too many vehicles and noise into the community and alters the residential nature of the neighborhood.

Vacation-rental operators and others, however, say such accommodations bring customers to local businesses, and help the tourism industry by providing visitors with an alternative place to stay.

Even as Hawai'i's visitor industry seemed to reach peak levels this year, the number of tourists visiting Hawai'i is expected to continue growing, albeit at a more moderate clip.

The state Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism projects 7.6 million visitors next year, 7.8 million tourists in 2007, and nearly 8 million visitors in 2008.

Those numbers assume there are no disasters or other outside events that could throw off tourism's growth. While Hawai'i has recovered from the downturns following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, SARS and the start of the Iraq War, such events have driven home how fragile Hawai'i's visitor industry is and how easily it can be affected by events thousands of miles away.

Tourism leaders are keeping an eye on the airline industry, which has been in financial distress, with high fuel costs and competition from low-cost carriers. But projected air-seat capacity to Hawai'i for the fourth quarter is up 3 percent over last year, and tourism officials are optimistic that the high demand for travel to Hawai'i will help preserve critical flights here.

The visitor industry is also closely monitoring any developments with the bird flu, which has killed dozens of people in Asia. Federal authorities have said that if the bird flu begins to spread into a global pandemic, they are not ruling out shutting down international travel, which would affect nearly 30 percent of visitors to Hawai'i.

Still, with the U.S. economy showing no signs of slowing and with the Japanese economy rebounding, there's much optimism that tourism in Hawai'i will continue to prosper. The state is also still enjoying its image as an exotic, yet safe, destination.

In the meantime, tourism leaders have been repeatedly emphasizing the importance of investing in the industry while times are good.

"Congratulations to everyone for a job well-done, and let's celebrate," incoming Hawai'i Visitors and Convention Bureau board chairwoman Karen Hughes said at the board's annual luncheon last week. But she quickly added: "Let's also assume that the good times are not going to last forever and let's plan for it.

"Let's not get complacent and rest on our laurels."

The industry has been focusing on attracting higher-spending visitors to increase tourist spending, rather than simply increasing visitor arrivals. Despite celebrations about the expected record number of visitors this year, tourism leaders recognize that the number of visitors can't grow indefinitely without straining the community and Hawai'i's natural resources.

Hawai'i Tourism Authority president and CEO Rex Johnson questioned whether the Islands' infrastructure can handle 8 million visitors.

"We're getting close to capacity and have to turn our thoughts to sustainability," Johnson said. "And the time to do that is when — at least for the visitor industry — we're having a very successful year."

If the industry puts too much pressure on the community and the infrastructure "then we will have a problem," Johnson said.

"If we overstep our infrastructure bounds and don't work on the product enough, then we will have an unhappy community," he said.

"And if we have an unhappy community, what we then will lose is this special thing that we call aloha. ... If we lose all that, we lose the very essence of tourism in Hawai'i, and therefore we will become like any other destination, and we can't afford to do that."

Reach Lynda Arakawa at larakawa@honoluluadvertiser.com.