Independent Road to Hana Tour

[shellseeker]

We are sailing on the Serenade of the Seas to Hawaii on October 5, 2007. We stay overnight in Maui and since this is a tendered port, can anyone tell me what is the earliest tender we can take in the morning? Our independent tour wants us to meet at the Lahaina pier at 7:00 AM.

 

We have one private tour company in mind, but does anyone else have any suggestions for tour operators for the Road to Hana. Husband and other family members really do not want to do the driving for this excursion.

 

Thanks for your help.

 

LuAnn

[LiznMartin]

Thought I'd "bump" this back to the top in the hopes someone may have some advice, as we are in the same position with neither of us wanting to drive!

 

LuAnn, can I ask you which private tour company you have in mind? We have recently booked on the POAm for 22 March 2008, so only just starting to plan.:D

 

Thanks in advance for any help given!:)

[shellseeker]

Hi Liz,

We booked a tour company called Valley Isle Excursions. They seemed really nice on the phone and I think we're paying a fair price - lower then what is offered by RCCL.

 

I've just not heard anyone on this board talk about this group so I hope we made a wise decision.

 

LuAnn

[Desert Cruizers]

LuAnn you say your tendered in, is that Lahaina? My husband & were in Maui several years ago and upon flying into Kahalui, we picked up our car and made the 50 mile trip to Hana. that 50 miles, took us a good 2 hours due to road conditions going up. It is a beautiful trip 1 lane bridge every other turn. Top speed for us tourist, 20-25 mph, am sure the locals do better. The question is, what time do you tender. I would check with RCCL.

[CC Help Michell]

We are sailing on the Serenade of the Seas to Hawaii on October 5, 2007. We stay overnight in Maui and since this is a tendered port, can anyone tell me what is the earliest tender we can take in the morning? Our independent tour wants us to meet at the Lahaina pier at 7:00 AM.

 

We have one private tour company in mind, but does anyone else have any suggestions for tour operators for the Road to Hana. Husband and other family members really do not want to do the driving for this excursion.

 

Thanks for your help.

 

LuAnn

 

Definitely check with RCCL on whether the tenders run all night. I've read reports here that they do for overnight Lahaina stops, but I think that was NCL (and wasn't paying that much attention as our ship is docking at Kahului). If they DO run all night, you shouldn't have any trouble making your appointment with an independent company. I cannot "vouch" for any company since I haven't been to Hawaii yet, but I did a lot of research on the Road to Hana because I knew we'd want to use an independent company there -- we wound up booking Ekahi Tours, through adventuremaui.com (they also book Valley Isle). You might want to check out the websites for both:

 

http://www.ekahi.com/

 

http://adventuremaui.com/islandtours.htm

 

The owner of the adventuremaui site is a Maui resident and has a lot of very helpful advice for cruise ship passengers, as well -- the site is well worth exploring even if you don't book anything with them.

 

PS well, darn it, I guess I didn't read the whole thread before replying -- oops! Valley Isle also looked very nice -- their website is: http://www.tourmaui.com/. We couldn't book Valley Isle because their pick up time didn't jibe with our ship's docking time on the first day (we're doing sunrise bike ride the second day, so have to do Hana on day one), but without that consideration we'd have gone with Valley Isle as well.