Hawaii Hotels??

1. What time of year?

2. What makes a great pool for you?

3. Will you be renting a car?

4. Do you want to leave the hotel to dine in other restaurants, or do you want to stick to the hotel dining options?

I think Maui has the widest selection of options for the type of resort you describe.

Well, $300 a night will get you quite a few very nice hotel rooms, but you'll have to add a bit for food and all the rest. However if you watch the sale packages and add a hundred bucks, you can stay at Kona Village Resort where the food and a lot of other things are included. Might work, might not, but the best way to find out is to look at www.davidskvr.net , a gift from me to the resort because I'm a big fan. it's unique among all the other Hawaiian resorts.
David

I saw this David, but to be honest there are only a few great pools in Hawaii. I would not say KVR has great pools. They are nice, functional, by the bar and a great place to relax but great/grand, I would not define it so. Hearst Castle has great pools. The Grand Hayatt on Kauai and the Four Seasons on the Big Island have grand pools. All great pools have a great price. So I thought I let the OP answer Placenames' inquiry. If the OP wants a great place with pools, well then you are spot on.

You're quite right, Bill. My thinking was that if OP went to my website he/she would see the pools and know if they qualify or not. All I know about them is that they're heated in the wintertime (some of the "great pools" aren't) and when you jump in, you get wet. OP started with "beautiful pool" which I think the KVR pools are.

Check out these:

Hyatt at Poipu Beach, Kauai
Hyatt at Kaanapali, Maui
Marriott Resort and Beach Club at Kalapaki Beach, Lihue, Kauai

They all have fantastic pools and are the kind of places you could be happy staying for days and without leaving the property.

However, the beach at the Hyatt Poipu is not swimmable.

The beach at the Hyatt Maui is very grassy and not that nice. You can walk down the way to Kaanapali. Also, the pool was busy and had lots of kids.

The Marriott Kauai pool looks great.

Sheraton Maui on Kaanapali - great pool, very nice rooms for $300/night, right on Black Rock for snorkeling, lots of beach and a good snorkeling spot, good views from most rooms, easy walk to Whaler's Village, shuttle from Whaler's into Lahaina.

Marriott's Maui Ocean Club on Kaanapali (this is mostly a timeshare). Ditto all the amenities that Sheraton has, except for the beach.

I think you'd better describe what you mean by "great pool" because the advice you've gotten has included pools that range from "serviceable" to "fabulous". The pool at the Sherton Kaanapali is very low-key --- if by "great", you mean something with slides, or a swim-up bar, or fantastic land/poolscaping, I think you'd be disappointed. But if you want a nice quiet pool among nice grounds on a wide beach, then the Sheraton might be just the ticket. The Marriott Maui Ocean Club on the other hand has more of a "designer" pool, as does the Hyatt.

Is Hawaii the right place?
I love Hawaii but when I'm looking for this I go to Mexico!!

How is the beach at Marriott Maui Ocean Club? Just curious because we are considering this property also.

We own a 1-week timeshare at the Marriott Maui Ocean Club and the beach itself is not as typical of "postcard Hawaii" as what you might expect, only because it's smaller than in other areas - not as much beach between the resort and the water. We love it, however - it's less crowded there than along other areas on Kaanapali.

Do some Googling for photos and live web cams on Kaanapali. I know the Sheraton and the Westin both have live webcams that you can actually pan around the area.

The new units (known as the villas) at the Marriott Maui Ocean Club are gorgeous (I know you were asking about the beach, but....). The older buildings have also been redone, but they are not full-blown apartments, don't have full kitchens, etc. I haven't seen those so can't comment on the luxe-ness!

Look at the "photos" section on tripadvisor.

http://www.tripadvisor.com/Hotel_Review-g60634-d87309-Reviews-Marriott_s_Maui_Ocean_Club-Lahaina_Maui_Hawaii.html

sf: we stay in the "ocean view" rooms, which are in any of the three main sections of the hotel - not the towers. These rooms are nicely appointed, with a separate bedroom and bath, then the living area and kitchen, with another bathroom. The kitchen area has a microwave, small fridge and a dishwasher, and is stocked with plates, bowls, utensils, etc. It's really all we need. I'm NOT going to cook while on vacation!! Nuking leftover pizza is the extent of what I'll "cook."

The Marriott also provides a number of outdoor grills for guests to use, and a lot of people fire those up every evening for steaks and burgers.

Frankly, we spend most of our week there every Feb. doing exactly what LDonnay is talking about - enjoying the pool (and the pool bar), gazing out at the breathtaking views, and just recharging.

iowagirl, I'd love to be able to do that!! I was only mentioning it because I know the new units are different from the units that were formerly the hotel.

Sounds like a good match for Kaanapali. We have pricelined resorts there a number of times, for well under the rate you mention. (For example, last fall, we got it for less than half of your budget.) Left plenty of room for food, drinks and other stuff!

iowagirl - that's exactly what we like and our stay at the Marriott Ocean Club was just that. The kids ahd a great pool and pool service to keep them busy and mom & dad re-cahrged/vegged. It was all good.

We also did that at the Hyatt and the kids do prefer the Hyatt over the Marriott.

I hate to say we take our annual Maui trek for granted, but anymore we really do. Our lives are so incredibly hectic (but no kids), that when we get there we just turn into beach bums. We've been to Maui so many times that we've "been there, done that" and while it's all still incredibly beautiful and utterly amazing, we just prefer to sit and enjoy staring at most of it, instead of running around to see it all every time - if that makes sense.

Suzie: gotta love that poolside service! We also keep telling ourselves that one of these years we'll trade our Maui week for one on Kauai.

Thanks for all the info! I'll be traveling next April, don't necessarily need a car, would like above average food and a postcard type beach. The pool...I'm looking for something with nice tile, interesting layout, above average pool chairs etc, a pool bar, trees...

I've looked at the Marriott Resort and Beach Club at Kalapaki Beach, Lihue, Kauai and the Hyatt on Maui. Any preferences for either??

Thank you so, so much.. I'm planning for a group of four and am hoping to find the "perfect" place.

I can help with some questions about the Marriott on Kauai as I own a timeshare there and have been there about ten times (last time was Sep. 2009). The pool is beautiful and last year they had started heating it! They also just finished remodeling all the rooms.

However I think you want to rent a car on Kauai because you will want to see Waimea Canyon and also drive up to the North Shore for a day, as well as try other restaurants. The bus is next to non-existent and does not go up to Waimea Canyon nor does it go past Hanalei on the North Shore, meaning you have no way to get to Ke'e Beach or the first two miles of the Kalalau trail. Tours are expensive and taxis are not real abundant so you would need to make arrangements ahead of time for them.

Sorry cannot help about Maui, been ten years or more since I last went.

I haven't been to Kauai but have stayed at the Hyatt in Maui a few times and really like it. Kaanapali is a good place to be if you don't have a car. You're on the beach boardwalk and it's only a short walk to the Whalers Village shopping center which has several shops and restaurants. Also, the Hyatt's restaurants are pretty good. We liked the poolside cafe Umalu which had a lot of good choices. Most of our favorite restaurants were a short drive away in Kapalua or Lahaina, but of all the ones in Kaanapali, we liked the restaurants at the Hyatt and Whalers Village the best.

Kaanapali is definitely a postcard type beach. The Hyatt itself doesn't really have much beachfront but it's not far down the boardwalk to get to the beach. The pool at the Hyatt is really nice. Very relaxing. We were there in March and were able to watch whales from our seats by the pool.

Hope this helps!

Have you considered the Mauna Lani on the Bug Island? We have been there and it has everything you are looking f,or

Sheesh- posting without glasses!

Big Island. Duh.

If you have a group of four and you decide on Maui or Kauai, you will really need to rent a car.

Why take the long flight to Hawaii? With your requirements, you could go almost anywhere.

A) Why NOT take the "long flight" to Hawaii? Maybe that's where the OP wants to go.

B) Do you know where he/she is coming from? The flight to Hawaii is no longer than the flight to NY for some of us.