Actually, despite it being 18 years ago, I can tell you exactly what I was seeing: On route from the airport to our resort (near Lahaina?) I noticed a smashed up car about 50’ from the side of the road in an thicket of trees and shrubs yet not particularly hidden. Even at that distance I thought the damage looked odd, as though it was done by someone with a sledge hammer as opposed to it being the result of an accident. (Dents everywhere I could see, including the roof and hood. Windows smashed.) What made it especially weird is that it was also covered with spray-painted graffiti. It also had the appearance of having been there a while and saw it again a week later on my way home.
I probably would have forgotten about it if I didn’t see another half-dozen nearly identical scenes in various locals around the island during my stay.
The juxtaposition of these wrecks among the otherwise paradisiacal setting caught me off guard.
I can’t imagine that it was anything like that. They were all in unpopulated areas. In most instances it wouldn’t have been impossible to park our car and walk over to them but I never did.
In my mind I began to tie them to the anti-mainlander bumper stickers I would see occasionally but couldn’t really explain why they might.
When we were on Kaua’i, we saw trashed, beaten cars hidden off the main roads. They were concealed in remnants of sugar cane fields or jungly areas. Locals told us that they were rental cars which had been stolen and purposefully wrecked.