advice on helicopter tours on Kauai
 

Hello,

My partner and I would like to do a helicopter tour of Kauai when we arrive there in late Jan 2009 (staying near Poipu). I've looked into Inter-Island Helicopters and Blue Hawaiian Helicopters. Sounds like Inter-Island has better viewing (doors off, more window seating) but does not offer a DVD of the trip. Are there any other differences between the 2 tour operators (sites covered, comfort, etc.)? We want to be able to "experience" the Napali coast and other sites without fumbling and worrying about taking photos in flight, so the DVD offered by Blue Hawaiian sounds nice, but it's not worth it if we don't have good viewing from the middle seats (and with our luck, we always end up with the bad seats!). Any opinions greatly appreciated.

ACC

www.birdsinparadise.com

I haven't done this, but I sure want to.

I did a "doors off" helicopter tour last February with Jack Harter. It was amazing.

We did doors off with InterIsland two years ago, good outfit.

Have not used Blue Hawaiian, they are fairly new to Kauai (but not to Hawaii) but they also seem to get good reviews.

Based on safety records we flew with Blue Hawaiian in Aug and loved it. We did take pictures and of course they offer the dvd too. You can see the photos we took (my husband had the rear middle seat) here:

http://luggagetag.blogspot.com/2008/10/remember-tc.html

and here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/4941107...7607443277409/

We did Blue Hawaiian on Big Island in Oct 06 and really enjoyed the flight. They were extremely professional and the DVD is something we watch every once in a while. In fact, we talked about it just today!

We sat in the front, next to the pilot and had glorious views. It was our first time on helicopter and we were very pleased with our choice. Their safety record was what won us over.

For us, no-doors did not appeal.

Deb

Blue Hawaiian for us on the Big Island & also Kauai. It was great, but skip buying the video - 'washed out' coloring & skips/gets stuck while playing.