Hi - we are hoping to go to Hawaii the first two weeks of Sept in 06. We may or may not be using FF miles with AA. Not sure yet. Because we may use FF miles I know we need to plan ahead. My husband has a problem with real long flights. Because of this we are thinking of flying to the west coast (where would be best?), staying overnight, and then continuing on to Oahu. We plan our first week on Oahu and the 2nd on Kauai. What is the best way to do this? Do I have to book all separate flights? We fly quite a bit on the main land but have never gone this distance. Any advise would be welcome. Thanks, sue

The most convenient way to me would be to stop over in Los Angeles or San Diego (SD is more scenic from the airport area) and then continue on to Hawaii. Both cities fly nonstop to HNL though San Diego may be a little more expensive. Alternatively if you want more excitement, you may want to stop over in Las Vegas, and Hawaiian Airlines and Aloha Airlines fly nonstop to Oahu daily.

You can try online booking engines to price the entire trip together, and then try separately to see what you can put together. Although I'm not certain, I think it will be most convenient to price separately on your own with different airlines so you can travel at your choice of time.

You can book on aa.com an afternoon departure from BOS to HNL. It will automatically have an overnight layover at LAX or SFO. [I don't think you want DFW or ORD.]

And you can also book multi-segment or open-jaw ticket on aa.com. So, you can do BOS-HNL, then LIH-BOS. Then just buy a seperate inter-island flight HNL-LIH or Hawaiian or Aloha.

We have friends who fly from Hartford, CT to LAX, spend the night at a airport hotel, and take the morning flight to Hawaii.

We are flying direct to Kauai on American Air this Aug. from LAX to avoid going through Honolulu and changing planes. You can fly into one city and out of another. I would do Honolulu first and then Kauai.
8-)

As long as you have two full weeks, try stopping in Las Vegas for a day going to Hawaii and San francisco on the way back.

Depends on what "has a problem with" long flights means. The flights from Boston to Hawaii come in all sorts of configurations - not only stopping on west coast (options include Chicago, Texas).

Using FF miles may present a problem with overnight stay - they may count it as essentially 2 RT per person since overnight stopovers are usually not figured in as part of the deal.

Would your husband be better able to fly if you bought tickets and used FF miles to upgrade?

Timing of flights on return may make one-night stay annoying - many flights leave in evening.

We live further west than you do and I have been contemplating the same problem. Getting TO Hawaii is never a problem but coming home they like to put you on those "red-eyes" and I'm exhausted for a week! Next time I'm going to use Delta to get from Arkansas to Oakland and Aloha Airlines to get from Oakland to Maui and/or BI, spending the night in Oakland both ways. I may use FF for Delta and pay for Aloha. - Whatever it takes! With AA and your destinations, Hawaiian Airlines might work out better for you.

I live in the Western part of Connecticut. We usually fly out of White Plains (or Hartford) to Chicago, then to the West Coast, and then to Hawaii on the same day without staying overnight on the west coast. We did try that once though using FF miles (for economy class, free seats) and were able to overnight in San Francisco. These days we follow the advice a previous poster suggested, we use the miles to upgrade -- definitely more comfortable, makes the flights much easier, but it makes the vacation more expensive. The only cities I would consider to break up long flights would be either Los Angeles or San Francisco depending on the schedule the next morning.

Call American and ask them their policies about staying overnight. Also ask about flying into HNL and out of LIH. I'm doing that this year on United (well, out of Kona, not Lihue) and didn't have any problem booking it...even did it online for "multiple" cities, saved the $5 fee they now impose to book via phone then called and had the seats upgraded. I was able to book White Plains, Chicago, to Honolulu on one day, stay overnight in HNL one night, then continue on Aloha to KOA. For the return trip KOA directly to ORD, then back to White Plains. The point of all this is that it was easily done online and the cost wasn't any more than had I done a round trip White Plains to Kona without the overnight in Honolulu.

I sympathize with your husband. It is a LONG trip from the east coast to Hawaii. Well worth it in my opinion, but jet lag and a full day flying takes its toll. We never schedule anything for the first day we spend in Hawaii. If we're tired, then we haven't ruined any plans. And if we're not, we can always do something spur of the moment.

In terms of "where would be best" on the West Coast....look at the AA schedule to Honolulu and plan accordingly. You'll only have one night in whichever city you select and most likely you'll want to stay close to the airport. There are plenty of hotels close to the airports and usually you can shuttle to them free of cost.

I've never flown from San Diego to Hawaii, can't comment on that. If AA has a direct flight to HNL then I would consider it. San Diego is lovely and there are nice areas near the airport.

Ditto the suggestion of using miles to upgrade your class so the long flight is more comfortable, and just get it out of the way.

Seattle also has one daily nonstop to Honolulu on Hawaiian Air (leaves here around 10AM arrives Honolulu local time at 2:30PM), so I'm guessing any major west coast city would be an option if you really want to overnight to break up the trip.

I used Delta miles to fly to LAX from Philly. Purchased a cheap ticket on Hawaiian Airlines to HNL from LAX. Then Hawaiian to hop over to Maui. Used Southwest to fly from Maui to Austin to spend a day sleeping. Then we ventured to San Antonio after a full 12 hours of sleep. Flew back from San Antonio to Philly using Delta FF miles. The trip over to Honolulu wasn't as bad as the night flight from Maui to Austin. Lost 5 hours in clock time due to time zone changes. That's why we slept a day in Austin. Wasn't the true plans for the stop in Austin but we truly needed the sleep.

In terms of what Island first....are you a shopper? If so, you should do Oahu last, so you don't have to lug all your purchases over to Kauai.

We did the trip -- but to Maui not Oahu -- and used United the entire way from Boston to San Francisco to Maui to LAX to Boston. All were non-stop flights, all about 6 or more hours. It was $800 per ticket and I thought that was a pretty good deal considering some of the flights I had seen on AA. I highly recommend a stop in CA before going to HI. We actually spent a few days in San Francisco and the Los Angeles/San Diego area before and after Hawaii to help us adjust to time changes and it was the best decision I ever made. We arrived in Maui already half-wy acclimated to the time change -- traveling with a young child made this very important. She was acclimated in one night. Coming back was a killer so it was nice to start the process more gently than if you had just gone straight home.