Need Maui / Kauai Advice
 

My husband and I are going to Hawaii for 10 days. Originally it was going to be 5 days in Kauai and 5 in Maui- now it's 6 in Kauai and 4 in Maui so we lost the 5th night free incentive at the Maui Hyatt.

We are considering 2 nights in Ka'anapali and 2 in Wailea but think this may be a hassle. Any advice?? Should we just stay put at one hotel (and which should it be?) or is Ka'anapali so different from Wailea that it's worth moving?

Currently we are looking at saving extra money by staying at the Ka'anapali Beach Hotel for the first 2 nights and going all out on Wailea- either the 4 Seasons, Grand Wailea, Maui Prince, Ritz, or the Kea Lani for the last 2 days and relaxing. After seeing the reviews of the Grand Wailea I'm scared to go there.

We don't have any kids and I've heard this may make a difference in where we decide to stay. Any advice in regard to anything is appreciated- as are any recommendations for Kauai- especially for a good sunset tour :)

Thanks all! We can't wait to get to Hawaii!!!

Stay in one place in Maui. Kaanapali is 55 minutes from Wailea (and vice versa). Without knowing your preferences it is difficult to suggest which place on Maui might be better. In general, Kaanapali is one long beach with many highrise hotels and condominiums. Wailea is a smaller, tonier, well-planned, low-rise community with connected crescent-shaped beaches. Wailea tends to be drier, and, in the Hawaiian winter, roughly November-May, the water is calmer.
The Ritz Carlton is in Kapalua, near nothing (but heaven).
Though I love Kauai, I would readopt your original split, 5 days on each island, unless you two are outdoorsmen. Unless you intend to hike extensively, I believe you can get a good primer of Kauai in five days-it's a small, slow paced, beautiful island. Strongly recommend a helicopter tour of Kauai. The north shore of Kauai is spectacular, the south drier. Avoid the east coast, especially if you intend to swim in the ocean.

I vote for staying in one place on Maui and travel as needed to experience the other areas. Save staying at another location in Maui as a reason for a future return visit. I am not sure which reviews are causing you concern about staying at the Grand Wailea. The Travel Channel ranked it as a solid number 5 out of the top ten beach resorts in all of the Hawaiian Islands. You will love Maui and Kauai! :S-

I just wanted to reassure you that the Grand Wailea is a beautiful hotel. My husband and I stayed there last summer and it is spectacular.Based on what I understand, Most people seem to complain about how busy it is and the service. I would suggest calling the Grand to ask what times of the year are their lowest occupany. We traveled in the 2nd week of June and the resort wasn't crowded at all. Although we only spent two days there, we wished we would have stayed longer.

Kauai is beautiful and the north shore is gorgeous.

Good luck in planning your trip.

Cindy

I would not consider splitting your short time on Maui between 2 hotels. Is it possible for you to do 5 and 5 on each island so you still get the 5th night free?

Hotel choices are sooo personal...I think you either love the Grand Wailea or you don't. It may be ranked in the top 5 but it's just not some people's style...

Thank you all for your help so far!

To add a little more additional information to the string above and questions that have come up, my husband and I are celebrating our anniversary and will be gone 7/25-8/4. We would like a trip that is relaxing without cellphones or laptops. :)

I've called the Grand Wailea twice to see what their customer service is like based on that little contact and they seemed very matter of fact (almost snooty) that they are rated as one of the top hotels and that's that, and if I want a terrace room I'll be over a noisy nightclub with a parking lot view so I better just pay for the upgrade to be in the garden area with the families who want to be close to the pool- this kind of turned me off. We don't plan on spending much time in our room so the view didn't really matter.

In Kauai we plan on relaxing at the Princeville resort our first day and doing a 4 hour horseback ride and sunset tour.
Day 2 is a Sunday so our options are limited- we plan pool/beach time and kayaking the hanalei river with snorkel/waterfall stops as they come up
Day 3 we plan on seeing the lighthouse (closed Sunday) and moving down to Poipu with a shopping stop on the way and a luau at Smith's for dinner.
Day 4 we'll snorkel Poipu and my husband will golf in the afternoon.
Day 5 is the Waimea canyon with dinner at the Beachhouse.
Day 6 we depart for Maui and will check into SOME hotel in Maui (currently the options are the Hyatt or KBH)
Day 7 we plan to learn to scuba in a pool and snorkel black rock- we heard about a Lahaina Colony crawl we may check out that evening and eat at David Paul's or Pacific-O
Day 8 we will either move to Wailea and snorkel Molokini or stay in Ka'anapali and still do Molokini. We are considering doing the sunrise drive late this night/early morning of
Day 9 and if that's the case we'll probably stay by the pool/beach area during the day to catch up on a little lost sleep.
Day 10 we have a 6:00 p.m. red eye flight that I take directly to a business conference that starts the next morning and vacation will officially come to a quick end :)

....as you will notice we left out the road to Hana- too many people have influenced my husband that it's not worth our time and I don't see changing his mind- he has a weak stomach so I understand.

Is there anything you think I can consolidate in Kauai to spend more time in Maui? We will be spending time with another couple there so I don't think we'll get bored.

Thanks again for all of your great responses!!

You may combine days 3 and 5, moving one of those dinners to day 4. The canyon is pretty and intriguing, but, unless you are doing serious hiking, it does not take a full day to see. Same with the lighthouse, though the area is beautiful. I strongly recommend doing a helicopter ride to see the canyon, and the napali coast, the latter is likely the very prettiest (breathtaking) part of Kauai. Also, I think the snorkeling at Ke'e beach is far better than at Poipu Beach. (you might also consider skipping the luau at Smith's and seeing one on Maui, perhaps day 8 or 9). Further, keep in mind that the island of Kaui is small. It takes little time (absent rush hour traffic) to get to Smith's or the canyon from Poipu. Travel by car is slowest up north.
Finally, Maui also is small. You do not need to (and should not) move to a hotel in Wailea (from Ka'anapali) to snorkel Molokini. Most excursions depart from Ma'alaea, on the same (west) side of the island as Ka'anapali.

Hey c21940,

If I may, one thing you left out on Kauai that I would absolutely recommend is a helicopter tour. The island is just gorgeous and there is only so much of it you can see from the ground. And if I might recommend an outfitter, I would go with InterIsland. Their copters have no doors for unobstructed sightlines and great pictures. They also have a private waterfall lunch that no other company offers. That 2 hour trip with them was the highlight of my honeymoon in February.

a few comments about your plans...

it looks like you plan on driving to the south shore (poipu area) on Kauai 3 days in a row from the n. shore -- that's a lot of driving! Maybe you can consolidate activities?? I would consider skipping snorkeling Poipu and snorkel tunnels beach on the n. shore...and combine that with some hiking on NaPali. I would also skip Smith's luau and go to the Feast at Lele in Maui (possbily in lieu of Pacific O). I also agree that a helicopter tour on Kauai(if you are up for it) is a MUST!


If you stay at the KBH, there's decent snorkeling right there and I would skip going to Molokini.

sounds like a fun trip!

And after reading hmmm's reply, I would 2nd the recommendation to hike the Kalalua trail. The views it has of the NaPali Coast are spectacular. The 8 mile trek to Hanakapi'ai Falls and back is worth every step (IMHO).

Thanks for the advice on the helicopter and additional hiking trail. I just heard about another helicopter accident killing tourists this month so I am a little hesitant to try it- although everyone I have talked to recommends it- I'm a little torn.

To clarify- we planned on spending 3 nights in Princeville ( the first we get in late night) and 3 nights in Poipu so that's why the break in activities. Now perhaps we'll combine the Kayak trip and hiking on day 2 (Sunday) and on Monday (day 3) hit the lighthouse quickly (or can I see it from the kayak ?? or sunset cruise??) and continue down to Poipu for a 2:00 tee time for my husband and the gals will head to the beach then on day 4 we can do Poipu snorkel and drive hike Waimea (what's the estimate of time to allow for travel here and time in the park?) I want to allow time to get to the beachhouse for sunset.

We may just cut a day from Kauai based or your comments and it sounds like we can get decent snorkeling at Kaanapali so I won't miss the extra time in Poipu. If we do the 5 nights in Maui we'll stay at the Hyatt and hike to snorkel daily as the Sheraton has been booked for weeks.

We're from Chicago so I'm used to a 1.5 hour commute daily each way to work- I'm sure 1 hour of beautiful scenery to see Wailea won't be bad at all!

sounds great! when do you leave? I would book your beach house resies well in advance...I made ours weeks before we left and had just an OK table...

don't worry about the heli tour - if you are not comfortable don't do it. you'll see wonderful views everywhere you go...

aloha!

Thanks Bogart! We leave on July 25th and can't wait!! I originally made reservations for hotels, etc. 3 months ago and now I'm second guessing everything. I will call the Beachhouse today!

If you really want a room with a garden view or better at the Grand, it would be better to book that category. That said, when we were there, we told the staff at the front desk that we were celebrating our anniversary and could they please consider an upgrade. We were upgraded to deluxe oceon view with a panoramic view of the oceon. The key, in our case, was to be very pleasant and kind to the desk staff.
Of course, there is no guarantee that you will get an upgrade, but you may want to consider this approach.

Remember as I said in my earlier post, we did go during the 2nd week in June.

Cindy

Hi c21940. I just wanted to add a couple of comments...You certainly will see spectacular scenery without going on a helicopter; we have had 3 very satisfactory trips to Kaua'i and have not done the helicopter thing. It is awesomely beautiful from the ground.

One sweeping view to which you can drive is Kalalau Valley. When you go to Waimea Canyon, continue on up as far as you can drive and take a look at Kalalau. It's one of those views you can just get lost in.

Have a great trip!

Don't split the Maui time, I'd even say don't split the Kauai time too. Don't think anyone's suggested a sunset tour - I assume you mean sea trip. We did HoloHolo Charters, very good. At this time of year there are trips out of Hanalei Bay again I believe. The Napali coast, from the sea, is not to be missed. Have a wonderful trip.

I think the arrangement with 6 days on Kauai and 4 on Maui sounds great. You will not have any problems of entertaining yourself on Kauai.

I agree with the other respondents to not spend too much time on the S. Shore. Not due to driving time as much as the N.Shore is so pretty why go South.

I don't know if you have a good deal at the Princeville but I know the Hyatt Kauai is offering 6night free and breakfast.

If $$$ are a concern, I would definitely not waste them on any of the Wailea hotels. I stayed at the FSeasons and visited the others. None really appealed to me. It was too crowded and reminded me of Southern California. Given that you are coming from Kauai, it is going to feel practically urban. Although, this may be what you are looking for.

Hi To all who have responded since yesterday!

Thank you for more great advice! I'm happy to hear you can drive to Kalalau Valley from the Waimea Canyon- that way we can add it to our south shore time. I will also take a closer look at HoloHolo Charters. I didn't realize in order to do a sunset cruise you had to board by 2:15. I'm used to daylight savings time so our sunsets are still pretty late in Chicago.

The reason we are splitting our time between the north and south is due to our friends wanting to stay at the Princeville resort, we can't afford it this trip so we'll be next store at the Hanalei Bay Resort where we get to share the same beautiful views and beach at a fraction of the price- I know we won't have a carbon window that fogs between the bathroom and bedroom area- but thats ok.

We had originally planned the whole time in Kauai at the southern end at the Kiahuna & now I'm very happy that plans have changed to include the north and south. We will be sharing a condo room at the Kiahuna and doing some catch up and relaxing since we don't see each other often- so sitting on the beach and drinking yummy drinks won't be a bad option if we ran out of things to do (which I don't anticipate as a problem.)

In reference to myname's posting, I wish we could have done Maui first then Kauai so we could leave completely relaxed- but available flights won't allow for that- but it's ok!!

I guess I was thinking by going to the Wailea side after the Kaanapali side we may see a little more of the relaxing side of the island as it sounds like Kaanapali is the Maui hotspot. It's funny you mention S. California and its similarities to Wailea, my friends are from San Diego and the reason they are staying 10 days in Kauai rather than doing Maui at all is to really get away from it all. In the midwest we'll take a tropical paradise any way we can get it- we know winter will be here too soon :)

Thanks again for all these great ideas! We're constantly re-adjusting our calendar of things to do!

you've got a great attitude and so I think whatever you end up doing (or not doing)...you're gonna have a great time!

we didn't do a sunset cruise...but I think captain sundown offers one from hanalei bay at 4 or 4:30 - may be worth looking into.

aloha!

aloha c21940!
on maui...how about two nights at the fairmont/kea lani in wailea and 2 nights at hale ana upcountry? check out haleana.com