Yikes: I haven't checked for a while - for San Diego - Kauai - but they are in the upper $700 range just googling rigft now.

The pop-up box beside this thread on my PC says $885 from Louisville right now. We went last year in June and paid ~$800.

just under $500 per person round trip from San Jose, CA to Lihue on Alaska Airlines

<the best time to buy tickets is 3-4 months out.>

That's not necessarily true. I've bought in advance and bought at the last minute, in my experience what makes the ticket more or less expensive is the time of year. I usually pay as little as $279-375 from Seattle in Nov or Jan. Right now they're running more like $600.

In Nov Allegiant Air will start flying Eugene Or to Honolulu - non stop flight- promotional fare of $179 each way- of course Allegiant has all those additional add on fees- but it will still be pretty inexpensive - only 1 flight a week though unless there is demand for more - hope to take them up on their kind offer

I buy my tix as soon as I can because I have not noticed air prices going down just like gas here in Bay Area.....Purchased SFO to HNL for Jan 2013 and it was $631! Didn't rpice Kauai cause that is next year. Gone up quite a bit since february 2012 but I did buy those tix about 6months earlier so probably bought them in June or July 2011. Never noticed, but does air fare change with seasons? I know January is high season and hotel prices are at a premium. Bought tix for TN in November about a month ago and they have already gone up in price.

I have noticed over the last few months that fares have been expensive to Hawaii... I'm also in Seattle and snatch them up when they are in the $325-350 range (which is what we have paid for the last 4 years). I haven't seen them under $450 for many months now (I've been watching). We always fly Hawaiian and I get their e-mails and haven't seen any announcements about sales in awhile either.

Nov-Dec-Jan-Feb are "high season" because that's when a lot of people go to Hawaii to escape the bad weather on the mainland.

June-July-August are also high season since that's when kids are out of school. So the best time to go should probably be March-April or October-November.

TAW, I just checked the Hawaiian airlines website. They have a $394 round trip fare San Jose to Kona or Lihue!!

Book: 5/22–5/28/2012
Travel: 8/21–11/14/2012
Las Vegas - Honolulu $502*
Los Angeles - Honolulu $573*
Oakland - Lihue $394***
Oakland - Kona $394***
Phoenix - Honolulu $705*
Sacramento - Honolulu $643*
San Diego - Honolulu $601*
San Francisco - Honolulu $603*
San Jose - Lihue $394***
San Jose - Kona $394***

Chicago $750-900 (offpeak-peak) 1500(Christmas)

DEN-KOA $750-$850 now for winter travel

They are real expensive, I just checked and nonstop LAX to Kauai is $965! Yikes, last time I went in 2009 I paid $650 and thought that was super expensive. Guess I will trade my timeshare and go back to Mexico again this year, Kauai will have to wait.

Shar's reply said gas prices were going down but not tickets. I've been thinking the same thing. In the last few months, around Austin TX, gas prices have gone from $3.70 down to $3.40 but the plane tickets are still so high.

Although prices are really high I will still pay to get to Kauai! Counting down to May 2013...