Need tips on using Costco to plan Hawaii trip.... hotel recs, etc.
 

We're trying to plan our 1st trip to Hawaii in October and have really been disappointed in the cost of finding airfare on our own. (About $800 from DC to fly to Kona and home from Maui) We've heard you can get good package deals from Costco and are considering that route.

Would love to hear other's experiences with this. What's the best way to get a good deal? Do you think it's cheaper than doing it on your own?

We're planning on 5 nights on Big Island (but may do that on our own so we can stay 2 nights in a B&B on Hilo side) and 5 nights in Maui.....

THANKS!

I have always found it to be cheaper to book everything myself. I go in off-seaon, as you will be, then I use the Entertainment Book for hotels (getting 50% off rack-rates), and my AAA and AARP memberships for discounts when I can. I have found that I can save several hundred dollars or more that way. Now this takes time....... and you have to like to organize things. Some people would rather spend more, and avoid the headaches of planning, which I can totally understand.

If you check Costco's packages, I would compare them with pleasantholidays.com's packages. PH's can be hard to beat.

That DC to Hawaii airfare sounds high to me for October. I might wait and look for something better after Labor Day....... Happy planning!

You might try flying East Coast to LA on one of the discount carriers (Jet Blue, Southwest) which can often be had for $200 or so if you watch the fare sales and then LA to Maui on one of the Charter carriers which are often around $300. So you could conceiveably do it for $500 to $600. The only thing you would have to consider is if $200 savings is worth the hassle. On a broken fare, if your inbound flight is late, the carrier has no obligation to rebook you on the outbound so you are pretty much on your own.

Jetblue flies into Long Beach so you would need to transfer to either Santa Ana or LAX to continue to Hawaii.
Check ATA out of the east coast. They have connections thru LAX to Hawaii daily.

Carabro, if your $800 figure includes a direct flight into Kona, then the interisland fare from Kona to Maui, then home, $800 is not so bad! When I plugged into Expedia, for October, I could get $550 per person on A.T.A., D.C. (Ronald Reagan) into Honolulu, two stops, for $559. Then you could get an interisland flight into Kona for around $80. Then interisland to Maui about $80. That is coming to about $740 pp. Don't know about anyone else but I think that would be pretty good. As I said above, I've always done better myself......... but you may not want to go to the trouble.

I think doing what Spokaneman suggests can work well when you're very flexible, and can grab the airfare sales to CA when they pop up, but if you have to plan well ahead, it may not work for you. Good luck with your planning...

What is the "Entertainment Book" por favour?

Go to entertainment.com to check out the book. It's full of discount coupons and offers that can save you muchos money!:-)