There are people who insist that Hawai'i is a place without seasons, people who view every month as the same and insist the only difference between the rest of the year and summer is the heat.

But if you know what to look for, Hawai'i is a place where summers are both subtle and special.

They can bathe you in anticipation and forge lasting memories. They can delight each of your senses.

TASTE

It's not hard to figure out what happens to Mark Suiso every summer. He may be a financial planner for First Hawaiian Bank, but his passion is growing mangoes on his small Makaha farm.

"This time of year I suddenly become everyone's best friend," he says.

But mangoes are the quintessential taste of summer in Hawai'i. Ripe and juicy or green with shoyu, nothing else compares, Suiso says.

"For those of us who grew up here as children, a mango tree was a big part of our life," he says. "What is summer in Hawai'i? For people who have access to a mango tree, it's a mango."

Although they have become more popular with chefs and can be found in stores across the country, mangoes are a vanishing fruit in local neighborhoods, Suiso says. There was a time when they were more common, when people left bags of mangoes at your kitchen door. Now there are newer subdivisions that don't allow residents to grow them, Suiso says.

"It's kind of sad that I see more and more people chopping down trees," he says. "It kills part of our culture. If you chop down a tree, your next generation is not going to have those memories."

Suiso, who favors good, tree-ripened mangoes, does what he can each summer to spread the joy of his favorite fruit.

"If I have a sick friend at a hospital, I bring a basket of mangoes and they get really good treatment from the nurses," he says. "A mango tends to be the best gift you can give."

TOUCH

Even in Hawai'i, where every day has the potential to be a great day in the sun, the sense of touch gets a boost every summer when you go to the beach.

The coarse feel of sand between your toes. The cool caress of a dip in the ocean. The warmth of sunshine.

Hawai'i beach expert John Clark says the beaches possess a special feeling because they were once alive. The sand created from once living coral reefs is different than beaches formed by eroding continental rocks, he says.

"There is a very different feel to our beaches," he says. "It's a very sensual feel and I think people who come here realize that right away. It's a very pleasurable sensation."

Hawai'i's warm water, best in summer, makes ocean recreation a treat, says Clark, who reviewed all of the state's beaches for his series of guidebooks.

"I think it's something that is really hard to put a finger on, but it has to do with the overall setting we are in," he says. "It's a combination of everything."

SMELL

The month of June gives summer a soft smell. The signature scents of the season come from pikake, tuberose, stephanotis and puakenikeni (above).

It's a time to savor, says Eric Tanouye, vice president and general manager of Greenpoint Nurseries in Hilo.

"They fill the whole warehouse with a beautiful sweet fragrance," he says. "I love walking into the building when it has that smell right about now."

His workers love it, too. Greenpoint ships out lei on a daily basis, so when the warehouse is full of flowers, it pulls them all in, he says.

"When the leis hit the building, you can see everybody smiling, going up to the leis," he says. "They want to put them on."

But there's another flower that smells like summer for Tanouye, who also serves as vice president of the Hawaii Tropical Flower Council.

Plumeria.

As a child, Tanouye would pick the blossoms at his grandmother's home in Hilo.

"Whenever we did something as a family, we gave plumeria leis," he says. "You didn't have to buy it. It grew in your grandmother's backyard. You picked it and gave it away."

SIGHT

The summer heavens promise a sight to behold, but you'll have to stay up late at night to see it.

The annual Perseid meteor shower promises streaking fireballs from space. Its shooting stars will begin to rain July 17 and last until Aug. 24, says Mike Shanahan, the Bishop Museum's director of education, exhibits and its planetarium.

The peak will be overnight from Aug. 11 through the early morning hours of Aug. 12.

Viewers can spot the meteor shower by looking in any direction. Although hard to predict, it's possible to see anywhere from five to 100 shooting stars in an hour, Shanahan says.

"Any place that has a dark sky is fine," he says. "Anyone with a lawn chair and a decent view of the sky can go out and check out the shower."

The Perseid shower occurs when the Earth's orbit crosses the path of debris thrown off by Comet Swift-Tuttle. The debris burns up as it enters the atmosphere. Local stargazers love the display. When the museum once held an organized viewing at Hanauma Bay, more than 1,000 people showed up.

"It's kind of a blink-and-you-miss-it thing," Shanahan says. "But they are still impressive when you have a decent shower."

SOUND

Few sounds say Hawai'i in the summer as well as the plunkity plunk from an 'ukulele, and one of the most popular venues for the four-stringed instrument is Roy Sakuma's annual 'ukulele festival (left).

The free event, now in its 39th year, has drawn as many as 9,000 people.

"There is an innocence to this instrument," Sakuma says. "When you play some other instruments, you can feel there is a tension or a strong sound coming out of it. But with the 'ukulele, it is a sweet, sweet sound that reverberates from the strings."

It has captured the imagination of people all over the world. There are 'ukulele festivals in Europe, Canada, Japan, Tahiti, Australia and New Zealand. Sakuma's festival, which he began in 1971, includes hundreds of children, as well as big-name musicians, including Jack Johnson, Jake Shimabukuro and James Ingram.

"Listen to the simplicity of the 'ukulele, those four strings in harmony, the power of the simple chords," says Sakuma, who runs a music studio with his wife, Kathy. "It just has this magic of drawing people together."