kureiff: I guess it depends on your dates. I just checked Costco for one-week rentals in Lihue, beginning July 10th, August 10th, and Sept. 10th.

ZERO availability!

I tried to get a quote on Priceline from June 7 to June 14 (so trying to avoid the holiday) and there are NO cars available for a one week rental. The same thing happened when I tried Costco. It also didn't matter if I changed the pickup day to a Tuesday, still no one-week rentals.

However if I bumped it up to a two-week rental than I got a quote @$2200 for a "dealers choice" economy car (Avis/Hertz group), for two weeks. In June, not May. May is before the California school holidays. Or it may be that there were last-minute cancellations.
The price was slightly better using Costco, but not by much ($2100 using Budget).

mlgb: Wow! That is just crazy!

Yeah the rental car price situation is nuts. Thanks for all the research and thoughts everyone!

Oahu is the one Hawaiian island you can get by without a rental car.

If you do the two weeks on one island, I would choose the big island with two locations. One on the Kona side and one on the Hilo side. Or do some time on Oahu where as has been mentioned you do not need a car.

There are Shuttle Services from the airports to wherever you might stay. There are also tour companies that would love your business if you want to do something more than sit on a beach.

You don't need to limit yourself to Oahu if you can't get a car rental.

Might be worth talking to a travel agent.

Thanks to everyone for your time, research, advice and suggestions. I wanted to provide an update here on our final plans, in case anyone’s interested. I had decided on Hawaii. But sadly that did not work out. With the cost of airfare, rental car, accommodations it was getting to be a lot.

But we are not doing ID/Montana either.

We had a trip already booked to Washington (Osoyoos/Oroville area). After the trip we will fly to Salt Lake City and stay in various areas in Utah for 3 weeks. We will do state parks, stargazing, hot springs and might venture into Idaho or Wyoming (so the girls can say they’ve been to 3 states - lol!)

This turned out to be the most reasonable option for us. Thanks again everyone!

Thanks for the update. I was afraid that Hawaii would be too much.

Manisha~ Thank you so much for posting your new plans. Should be a great fit. It's really appreciated here when people let us know the results.

Hawaii would be my pick, but I heard only 1% of the population got the vaccine. If you got the vaccine then I'd still say hawaii. The culture, the restaurants, beaches, trails. Etc. But Idaho, Montana & Utah might be the wisest choice.

Enjoy your trip wherever you decide.


Lynn

ldatt22 did you not read that the OP already decided that they are not going to Hawaii?

The State of Hawaii is over 40% fully vaccinated. There are some issues with their data reporting so you may have looked at a website such as the NYTimes which just ignores Hawaii.