We just spent 3 nights in Honolulu and 6 nights on the Kohala coast of the Big Island. We are a family of four, two parents in their early 50s, two kids in early 20s. We flew on Delta, direct from Atlanta. Long flight, but felt the time difference much more coming home. Delta had us on a huge plane, probably the largest I have ever been on. It had an upstairs and over 75 rows downstairs. We flew coach, cattle class going and the lucky parents had economy comfort on the return with kids in the back. EC is definitely worth the few extra bucks for the leg room alone. The only negative is that Delta stopped food service on this flight which I think is pretty crummy. You spend 1200 dollars a ticket and you get a soda and some peanuts on a 9 hour flight or you can buy the crappy meal. We took food on board.

We stayed at the Hilton Hawaiian Village in Waikiki for the three nights. We rented a car through Alamo. If you plan to only be in the Waikiki area, skip the car rental. It took forever to get the car and return it and we paid to park it and we could have easily taxied for less. Lesson learned.

We did two really fun things in Honolulu. We all either walked or ran the Honolulu Hibiscus 5 mile race early our first morning on Oahu. The sun rose shortly after the race began. Very fun!

We also did the Floating Lanterns on Memorial day. This was a huge highlight for all of us. We waited on line that morning for over an hour for our lantern. We decorated it for my father and father in law. The floating ceremony was beautiful. We floated one of the 6000 lanterns and there were over 40,000 people in attendance. You actually walk out with your lantern into the water with your clothes on and push the lantern out with thousands of strangers. It was very moving and I highly recommend it if you will be there next memorial day!
My one daughter and husband did para sailing and said it was a lot of fun! It wasn't very expensive either. It was one of the cheaper things they did!

Next stop was the Big Island. Flew Hawaiian air. Going was more fluid. Returning to Honolulu was pretty chaotic trying to check in and check bags. There are a million different lines and no person giving direction.
We participated in a timeshare package at Hilton's Kingsland property for 6 nights at a great price for a two bedroom timeshare. The hitch was listening to a 90 minute presentation. This turned out to not be a hard sell. We listened and felt it could be a good deal if we lived closer to Hawaii. Especially since now they offer it more as a points deal. It was not for us and we just said thanks but no thanks and that was it. We had a great two bedroom condo. It was nice to have the space of two bedrooms and living room/kitchen area. It also had a large deck that you could sit out on.

Things we did on the Big Island:
One daughter/husband went on the Blue Hawaii helicopter 2 hour tour from Waikoloa. They saw the lava from the volcano, waterfalls and valleys. They really enjoyed the tour. The pilot was retired military and they felt very safe and found him quite informative.
Both daughters did the Dolphin Quest. Some people are really against it, and I can see that it does seem like they are kept in a little area, but the actual experience lasts less than 30 minutes and is not cheap. My one daughter felt it was the most wonderful experience.

We snorkeled down in the Kona area and found the snorkeling pretty good, but the beach we were on was so rocky that it was difficult to get into the water and then past the reefs. It is a public beach and we watched some man fall and get all cut up.
Our favorite beach to hang out for the day was Hapuna Beach. Best boogie boarding waves and the sand was so soft!

We did the luau at the Hilton and it was fun! The show was cute, and the food was pretty good with a good variety. The drinks were free but pretty watered down, so mostly fruit punch.
Dining on the Big Island.
We dined at Hilton's KPC restaurant which was a really nice setting over looking the water. I had a fabulous piece of macadamia nut encrusted Ono. It was so delicious and do not really like fish all that much.
We went to Sansei Japanese Restaurant. If you love sushi, try it. That is the only thing on the menu that was liked. Since two of the four in our family don't like sushi, this was not a good choice. The food outside of the sushi was very mediocre. One meal was downright inedible. Also, the food from the sushi bar came at least 20minutes after the two other meals were served.
Lava Lava Beach Club. We dined here twice because it was close to our resort, had a fantastic sunset view, some live music and a pretty decent maitai and food. We all liked our meals and so we went back to relax and watch the sun go down again our last night for dinner!
Huggos on the Rocks. We dined at the casual side. You sit in the sand and listen to music. I did not like my burger because it had a spice to it, but DH loved it. I did love my dessert which was a Kona coffee icecream cake, to die for..

All in all, we had fun on the Big Island. This was our second trip there, with the first one over 10 years ago. I think if we make it back to Hawaii, I would like to see Kauai since that is the only one I haven't gone to, but also would like to see the north shore of Oahu and have some more fun in Honolulu.

Glad you all had a good trip!

Sounds like a nice trip. Did you get to Volcanos NP, or the Botanical Gardens or any of the wonderful waterfalls?

Thanks for the report.

When you walk into the water with your clothes on, do your clothes get wet?

Ha ha Waldo! I wasn't expecting to go waist deep to float the lantern otherwise I would have worn my bathing suit and not my shorts!

emalloy, we drove to VNP and Akaka falls last time we were in Hawaii about 10 years ago. This time my husband and daughter did a fly over them. We spent our time on the Kohala coast this time.

Thanks for the nice report!! I agree about (not) renting a car for Waikiki/Honolulu. I love it there and do just fine getting around on foot, The Bus, taxi or shuttle for the airport.

I love the Big Island, too! The last time we were there, we stayed in a condo near the Hilton. Our daughter enjoyed riding their tram/train around the property.

We're hoping to get back in March.

Thanks for reporting. First hand and *recent* information is great.

If you'd asked here, you would have known about no car in Honolulu. LOL