Hey Guys,
So I've going to visit Hawaii for 7 days late Feb, I was wondering if you guys have any suggestions what to do in order to maximise my time there.
I'm planning to do: Oahu and Maui :)
Suggestions for: accommodation, shopping and what to buy and bring back to Aus would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks heaps :)
Thanks so much Altomic x
I wouldn't write off hitting Kona up.
So much to do and cheaper than Maui and Oahu.
Thanks so much QW3RTY - I will look this up.
I was just looking up accomondation at Maui, gosh its like daylight robbery!
To be honest, I enjoyed Kona more than Maui, but Oahu/Waikiki is still the most complete experience.
In Kona we went snorkelling with Manta Rays at night, zip lining through a fruit plantation, went secret beach exploring, explored the active volcano and cycled right up to the lava flow, scaled the Mauna Loa volcano to the observatory (we went from 30 degree temperature at the beach to 4 degrees on the mountain), went to Kukio Beach and sunbathed with turtles for free, and just ended up driving around and making our own adventure.
On Maui, we got hammered and stayed within the confines of the resort until we hit up a Luau.
If you fancy an "adventure" component to your holiday, I really would recommend it.
Sounds like Kona might be worth the visit if we go back. Thanks for the info.
We only stayed on Oahu.
My suggestions are:
a) Hire a car - it is the easiest way to get around, althought the buses are meant to be pretty cheap but might take you a time to get anywhere.
b) If you want to buy cheap souveneirs there is a market at the local stadium - it is open on Wednesday, Saturday. Check it out online.
c) There is an outlet place that is worth looking at for clothes etc.
d) The climb up Diamond head is pretty good but I would park outside and walk in via the tunnel, they have these trolley buses that take up the whole tunnel so they can only allow one in each direction at a time this causes the traffic to back up. Go relatively early before the crowds get large.
e) There is a beach near the top of the island you can go snorkling with turtles. It was the highlight of our trip. If you want further details I can track down the name and details.
f) We stayed up the top of the island which is quieter, if you want more "bustle" stay at Waikiki.
g) The supermarkets are pretty good if you want to cater for yourself.
h) Pearl harbour was worth a look. It is free but if you want to go out to the USS Arizona memorial then you need to pick up the tickets early in the day before they are gone. We parked at the memorial, picked up the tickets then walked across to the stadium to get our souveniers before coming back for our session. It is actually interesting to wander around at Pearl Harbour there are some interesting exhibits,
i) The Polynesian centre is worth a look and you get 3 days visit with the ticket. Try to get in early to get tickets to the luau, we were too late so we had the buffet, which was adequate. The film in the Hawaii section is spectacular. The ride in the boat was fun.
j) The Japanese temple was a bit meh, but it was raining when we went.
The beaches are good and the ones we visited had good toilet facilities. We went at Christmas time and the waves were pretty big and some of the beaches were washed away.
Beware, when it rains it absolutely teems down. Pack an umbrella and a splash jacket.
Enjoy.
Hi Try2bhelpful,
Thanks so very much for the indepth advice.
a) Yup I was told to hire a car :)
c) Do you recall which centre this is? I'm guessing Premium outlets is the best?
e) If you can really kindly advise me where you snorkelled with turtles, that would be very very much appreciated. it would definitely be my highlight too
Thanks so much!!
Let me chat to my other half, he is the driver, and I will get back to you with details.
I'm pretty sure it was Premium Outlets we went to. The Godiva chocolates were mighty fine and we bought some Levis and splash jackets (did I mention the rain before). If you decide to go there then there is another shopping centre across the road from the Premium Outlets place, it is much easier to park over there and walk across.
The beach is up near the chocolate and Coffee "plantation" at the top of the island, but I will track down the name; it is right next to an ordinary street with houses. You go to the beach, look for the A-frames just behind it and then go out about 20-30 feet from there until you find a rock under the water, the turtles were around the rock. They were quite big ones and there is usually between about 4 and 8 of them. You can just hover over them and they seem completely unfazed by people as long as you aren't splashing about. It isn't that deep so you see then reasonably close, they come up for air every now and again so you do need to avoid them. Also you could see the fish cleaning their shells. Magic.
The surf was quite rough so you need to be a bit careful putting on the flippers.
There is another rock pool further down the coast that has fish you can snorkle with; it is just over the road from the local North Shore Foodland supermarket. You need to watch out for the volcanic rock as it is sharp and slippery. You need to watch people entering the pool to see where the best entrance is to avoid the rocks. You are likely to end up with a few cuts and scrapes from the pool here, but it is sheltered and there were quite a few fish.
If you are going swimming, snorkling, etc then get yourself rashie tops. I ended up with a sunburnt back from the rock pool. I borrowed/purloined by brother's spare rashie to go snorkling after that.
If you are staying on North Shore and buying from the Foodland then sign up for their discount loyalty scheme, they only need a 7 digit phone number, our mobiles were fine, and it does make a big difference to the prices of some goods.
Will provide further details tonight.
The beach was Aweoweo.
bah that yellow sand on waikiki and other places is from Jervis Bay….
Well white sand you mean.
And so the legend says (but no).
Why accept a poor subsititute like hawaii when Australia has a zillion better beaches and other places to visit, eg the Great Barrier Reef.
Haha i've done Great barrier reef twice :)
Have you done ALL the GBR ? What about WA coast ?
WA is really expensive :( Its better to go overseas
It is funny, I've done a fair bit of travel around Europe and America but hardly any travel in Australia. Figure I will do all that when I'm too old to sit on a plane for a ludicrous amount of time and then walk through a dozen art galleries a day.
I've done quite a few trips around Australia due to timing. But i agree with you, you can do Australia whenever… but overseas is much harder especially if you have a growing family (prob easier doing Aus).
Marukame Udon
Thanks, they actually have this in Chatswood, NSW :)
Haven't tried the one in Chatswood, but the one in Hawaii was sensational. Better than a lot I have had in Japan
better than japan? no way!!!
@debe: I was surprised as well. But a lot of Japanese people go to Hawaii for holidays, so it makes some sense
Was there for 6 days on each island, Maui was awesome
If the volcano on big island is spewing out lava, I would Defs check it out, was no action when we went and felt big island wasn’t as good as Maui or Kauai. Snorkeling in Maui was AMAZING
Have fun, waikiki is alright..but better experiences to be had on other islands imo
may I ask where you snorkelled in Maui?
Thanks :)
Will look them up when I get home
Was incredible, took us off to a very small island way out, the water was glass clear when it it. From the boat I could see all these blobs thinking it was rock formation under the surface but was millions of fish. Then took us back near the shore and we snorkeled with turtles
Tricky thing is tho all the tours leave from the same place, Defs get there early as parking was extremely limited and I ended up dropping the wife off, making up a parking spot, then running round the whole bay to the wrong boat, and then ran all the way back when the boat captains radio’d each other 😂 said it happens all the time though but still 😞
90% sure it was Pride of Maui
Defs get a tour that goes to molokini (that’s the island I mentioned above) was such a good experience, one where u go “wow I could really get into this as a hobby if this is what I’ve been missing out on”
Would have tried the snuba but we left booking till late
We also did Haleakalā at both sunrise and sunset, Defs check it out at some point. (Wouldn’t have done both but were on a tour for the sunrise and wife got incredibly sick so spent the whole trip puking and missed it lol)
Waikiki is crap. Just a manufactored beach lined with hotels and apartments. Think gold Coast with less coastline and shitty food.
Some good tips above. Go to Turtle Beach on the north side of the island, hanumana bay (spelling) for snorkeling (missed it last time but will go next time), Diamond Head, premium outlets, then get out and go to one of the islands or at least a different location other than waikiki.
seriously - do a search using terms such as "hawaii" "oahu" "maui" "waikiki" and you will find dozens of similar posts as your own.
here, I've done it for you.
you only have to click the links
waikiki search results
hawaii search results
maui search results
oahu search results