Aloha!

We flew. We only had 6 days and we wanted to spend it all on land.

Admittedly, cruises have never held much allure for me, except for Alaska. Everyone says those Alaska cruises are the best.

Did you have any spam while you were there?

Let us know - I would love to know - my daughters both want to go to Hawaii (or any of the islands not to offend our Hawaiians)...my brother goes there often as he has a friend that lives there.

We stayed at the Aulini in Ko Olina. It's a resort that is owned and operated by Disney but other than a few characters popping up once in a while it isn't "Disney", if you know what I mean.

The good things: The service was absolutely amazing. You get so completely spoiled by the staff there that... well... I don't know what. Just superb. It super, super clean. I mean the scrubbed fresh daily kind of clean. None of the pools were very deep and they had lifeguards every few feet -- people could turn their kids loose and not worry about them at all. There are at least 6 pools - that's how many we found -- there are probably more, plus a lagoon.

They have activities going on all day for kids and they batch them by age: things/areas for little kids, things/areas for tweens, things/areas for teens. They have a snorkel pond full of native fish where you can float and just watch all the goings on. One of our favorite things was the storyteller: each night they have a big bonfire and a master storyteller tells native folktales. Amazing!

The bad: parking is expensive ($35 per day). We were glad we had a car though because their menus were limited and there wasn't much that Mo would eat. Plus, their food was VERY expensive (food everywhere was pretty expensive though). The expense of having a car and having to pay to park it probably evened out when you consider the food prices.

I'd definitely stay there again, given the chance.

Thanks no sure when we will have the opportunity - but it is some where we would like...

Did they have spam?

No Spam. If fact, I only saw Spam on one menu!

damn - that is what I was hoping for - spam and eggs

If you come to my house I'll cook you Spam and eggs!

Come to "the Big Island" of Hawaii, then, Linkat. You won't find a breakfast place that doesn't have spam and eggs on the menu! You can go to a Pizza Hut or Domino's and get Spam on your pie.

wonderful - just why I would travel for hours and hours to enjoy the luxury of spam on my pizza.

checked for school spring vacation - all 4 of us to go with airfare for under $6,350. Looks like we need to save a little money first.

We went at an "off" time. Plus, we booked before the hotel had even opened with a special offer they sent to us so we got a good deal and it was still expensive. The hotel is still only about 2/3 open but all the construction is finished so there wasn't any noisy building going on. I'll bet if you signed up for emails on their website you'd get some discount offers.

They are offering - 6th night free and a free breakfast. We aren't planning for this year - as we hope to sell and buy a house. I go a couple weeks later and save $1k in the airfare - rooms the same.

I just wanted a starting point to see what the prices were.

Beautiful pictures!
The last time we went to Hawaii (we took German friends and were a group of six), we rented a house there and I'd do it again, we liked it much better than staying at a hotel.