Leeward
Kona means leeward — the sheltered side of an island, away from the trade winds. It is a direction before it is a place, and every island has a kona side. On Hawaiʻi Island the word settled into the name of the district itself.
A kona wind is one blowing from that quarter, which in Hawaiʻi means out of the southwest and usually ahead of a storm. Kona weather is the muggy, still, rainy kind that arrives when the trades fail.
Coffee, and the sun
The Kona slopes have an unusual daily pattern — clear mornings, afternoon cloud, mild nights — which suits coffee well enough that Kona is one of the few places in the United States that grows it commercially. The first trees were planted in the 1820s.
The main town is Kailua-Kona, which is a Kailua like the one on Oʻahu with the district name attached to distinguish it.