Is a rental car a must everywhere?

[itchintogo]

Hi all. We will be taking our first cruise to hawaii...summit, dec 9th...14 nights. After reading all these wonderful helpful posts, it seems that unlike alaska and the caribbean where excursions are easy to book on your own, and the ports are easy cab rides or walks to the sights, that the best way to see anything when on a Hawaiian cruise is to rent a car. Is that correct? We will be visiting Hilo, Maui, Honolulu (2 days), and Kailua Kona. Does everyone agree that a rental car is the way to go? It seems that it would be less expensive since we'll have 4 people, as opposed to booking excursions through the ship. And we'll be able to see what we want, stop when we want. If anyone can confirm this that would be extremely helpful in our final planning! If anyone can offer suggestions in ANY of these ports, it would be greatly appreciated. Thanks so much!!!:D :rolleyes:

[beachchick]

Yes, rental car is the way to go, IMO. Taxis (which would be private taxi, not taxi vans) would be prohibitively expensive for island touring and local transportation (except on Oahu) is somewhat limited. There are not rows of vans lined up at the piers as in the Caribbean or Alaska. (However, there are tour companies that offer island tours. There's a current thread going about those right now. It's called "Private Tours" or something similar.)

 

As you have read, rental cars are usually the least expensive option and give you the freedom to choose your own itinerary.

 

As for suggestions, that's really too broad a question for me to answer. There's so much to do on the islands that it would take me hours to type it all out (a good deal of it is readily available on this forum). It would help enormously if you would give us some ideas about your likes/dislikes, fitness level (or lack thereof), ages, etc. I suggest that you browse the forum here for current and recently current threads about activities and/or do an Advanced Search on this forum only going back 3 to 6 months for things you know would interest you, such as "X snorkel" or "X beach" or even "X excursion" (where X = the name of an island) or things like "helicopter" or "haleakala" or "volcano". There's a ton of good information to help you start to narrow down your preferences.

 

beachchick

[itchintogo]

Beachchick: Thanks so much for your response. I guess I really needed the confirmation of what I've deduced from reading the message boards. At least I feel I'm on the right track. And you are right, there is SO much helpful info here, we're coming up with a plan on what we want to do in each port.

 

Thanks again!:)

[Eliger]

Hi "itchintogo",

 

We are also four travelling together and on the same cruise - Dec. 9 Summit. We have made arrangements for a vehicle at three of the four stops. After doing the research, it is the best way to go :D .

 

Have you registered for the Cruise Critic Connection Party? You can visit the Roll Call thread: http://messages.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=320307&page=26.

 

Gerry

[beachchick]

itchintogo: My pleasure. Have fun planning your cruise. The hardest part will be choosing which of the many great activities you prefer.

 

If I may, some words of advice and warning: While it's tempting to try to "do it all" in Hawaii, there's no way you can; not with a day, not even with a week on each island. Choose the things that appeal to you the most and be sure to leave time to just BE in Hawaii, to lie on the beach or by the pool or anywhere you like and hang loose. Otherwise, your memories of Hawaii will be that all you did was rush, rush, rush to try to cram in as much as possible. You should have memories of what a fun and relaxing time you had in the beautiful islands.

 

beachchick