Hawaii dilemma

Ok experts here's my quandary,. I'm a loyal Royal and thinking of going to Hawaii. As most of you know NCL has a great cruise, all Hawaii and no Sea days. Royal has a cruise but involves 5 sea days. I'm thinking of doing a b2b on NCL due to the great ports. With a eleven hour flight as much as I love Sea days I think spending 5 days at sea instead of the islands can be counter productive. Any thoughts?

If you are going with the purpose of seeing Hawaii, you should do a land vacation. It's much easier for Americans than most places that cruise ships sail. If you want to do a cruise with a little bit of Hawaii thrown in, by all meals do the NCLA cruise.

Hawaii is all about the Aloha spirit, the relaxed way of life etc. You won't get that on a cruise. There are so many things to do on Hawaii - I've spent several months and have only scratched the surface.

If you want to get the best of both worlds, you could do one of the one way cruises that go to or depart Honolulu and do a land vacation before or after your cruise. Radiance of the Seas does two cruises each year in transit between Vancouver and Sydney. Celebrity's Solstice does the same.

I know exactly the one you are looking at and I'm very interested in it too. It looks like NCL is the only one that has this. I was so disappointed when I searched RC and found I had to spend five sea days getting there. I prefer to use those five days in Hawaii. I would fly in a couple days early, see Oahu and then board. Then after the cruise spend an additional night or two just relaxing on the beach before flying home.

Well basically you have three options... A) NCL B) Cruise another Line either there and back or a one way or C) land trip.

There's no way I'd do the return westcoast Hawaii cruise, there are far too many sea days and not enough Hawaii. We just did the one way on Solstice with 4 days in Oahu beforehand. We liked that and would probably repeat but to get more of Hawaii, if it were me, I'd opt for NCL once and then spend your other week on one of the Islands. The NCL itinerary truly is fantastic but I think I'd rather pair it with some Island time rather than doing it twice.

We did 15 night Hawaii on Star Princess recently. Loyal Princess people (Elite members) but never, ever, again from LA. Way too many sea days and we missed Lahaina. Rough seas, the roughest we have experienced in all our cruises ( we cruise 50+ days a year). If I go back to Hawaii it will be a land trip.

Love cruising and love Hawaii. My opinion ..... do both. I would do a part land trip and part NCL. The land portion is super easy since it is the Good Old USA!! Everything just feels like home. Same grocery stores, same TV, same traffic laws, same hospitals that accept your insurance, same customs.

If you want to get the best of both worlds, you could do one of the one way cruises that go to or depart Honolulu and do a land vacation before or after your cruise. .

This!

48 days to go :) :) :) :)

If you are going with the purpose of seeing Hawaii, you should do a land vacation. It's much easier for Americans than most places that cruise ships sail. If you want to do a cruise with a little bit of Hawaii thrown in, by all meals do the NCLA cruise.

 

Hawaii is all about the Aloha spirit, the relaxed way of life etc. You won't get that on a cruise. There are so many things to do on Hawaii - I've spent several months and have only scratched the surface.

 

If you want to get the best of both worlds, you could do one of the one way cruises that go to or depart Honolulu and do a land vacation before or after your cruise. Radiance of the Seas does two cruises each year in transit between Vancouver and Sydney. Celebrity's Solstice does the same.

What I didn't like about Princess Hawaii was the no sail by the volcano at night, the highlight of my Rhapsody Hawaii cruise.

I agree to do a land trip to Hawaii. I spent 2 weeks there, 1 week on Oahu and 1 week the Big Island. 1 week on the Big Island isn't even enough to see everything.

What I didn't like about Princess Hawaii was the no sail by the volcano at night, the highlight of my Rhapsody Hawaii cruise.

She's not flowing into the ocean right now anyway so it wouldn't matter :(

here is how I would rate the islands to visit.

 

1. Kauai..our favorite..small home town feeling ..no high rises very tropical and relaxing..

2.Maui....alot to see and do or just sit down and enjoy a nice sunset..

3.Hawaii the big island..very big not much to do accept the volcano. since the island is still growing, based on lava flow, the beaches are not the best...

4.Oahu...you can keep it..its just another big city with palm trees..

 

Agree with the above assessment. Having visited these four islands plus Molokai ten times, I would opt for a land vacation over cruising Hawaii.

Ok experts here's my quandary,. I'm a loyal Royal and thinking of going to Hawaii. As most of you know NCL has a great cruise, all Hawaii and no Sea days. Royal has a cruise but involves 5 sea days. I'm thinking of doing a b2b on NCL due to the great ports. With a eleven hour flight as much as I love Sea days I think spending 5 days at sea instead of the islands can be counter productive. Any thoughts?

I had the same issue, couldn't decide what to do. Had a Celebrity cruise booked but decided I didn't want to spend that many days at sea. In the end we chose NCL because of the overnights in Maui and Kauai. Flying to the west coast, spending a day there before flying to Honolulu to spend a few days before our cruise. Since it's our first time to Hawaii, we did not want to spend that much time on a ship doing nothing when there are too many places to see in Hawaii and not every cruise on other lines even stop in Kauai.

Very interesting answer. I have a goal to visit all 50 states and Hawaii will be my last visit. [still have 9 to go] :D I thought we would combine one of the one-way cruises and a land visit. . . .may have to rethink this.

We love Celebrity but we went on the Pride of America because of the itinerary and no sea days. This itinerary is not about the ship (although there was nothing wrong with it. The crew was friendly, the cabins were nice and clean and the food was good). For us it was all about the ports and it was a great way to get a taste of each island. We spent 2 nights in Waikiki beforehand and went to a luau there and hiked to the top of Diamond Head.

We'd love to go back, but now we have some idea of which islands we'd like to go back to and spend time on. Each island is so different - we flew over Kauai, hiked down into a volcano on the Big Island, saw a sunset from the top of a volcano in Maui....although only a short time in each place, it was enough to feel the aloha spirit of the people and the islands.

we have been to hawaii over a dozen times, living on the west coast is easy for us to go..each island has so much to offer. Each island is so different that one day in port doesnt do it justice.. here is how I would rate the islands to visit.

 

1. Kauai..our favorite..small home town feeling ..no high rises very tropical and relaxing..

2.Maui....alot to see and do or just sit down and enjoy a nice sunset..

3.Hawaii the big island..very big not much to do accept the volcano. since the island is still growing, based on lava flow, the beaches are not the best...

4.Oahu...you can keep it..its just another big city with palm trees..

 

take the cruise and then pick two islands and split another week there pre or post cruise..

The beaches on the Kohala Coast of the Big Island (Hawaii) are frequently rated in the top 10 in the world.

I agree that a land vacation is the best way to experience Hawaii!

We actually cruise less since we discovered Maui! What we like is that we can relax on the beach, sunset dinner, and just enjoy! So much to do and see. Too many sea days for us.

She's not flowing into the ocean right now anyway so it wouldn't matter :(

We actually cruise less since we discovered Maui! What we like is that we can relax on the beach, sunset dinner, and just enjoy! So much to do and see. Too many sea days for us.

Us too, although not Maui as much anymore. The last couple of years we've been to Hawaii twice a year.

Even when it's not flowing into the ocean you still can still see the Red glow at night. I Went by in in May and was a wonderful sight.

We went by in May too and nothing. I have seen it free flowing and it's wonderful

We went by in May too and nothing. I have seen it free flowing and it's wonderful

Kauai has some great waterfalls, but IMO they do not compare to those on the North-East Coast of the Big Island. Admittedly some of them take some effort to get to, but I have stayed in the Waipi'o Valley (accessible only by 4 wheel drive or foot) and the falls there and in the adjacent Waimanu Valley are fantastic. Waihilau Falls is estimated to have a 2600 foot drop, making it one of the world's tallest (Angel Falls in Venezuela at 3212 feet is generally recognized as the world's tallest).

IMO on a tropical island anything taller than a palm tree is a high rise, so I'd say that Kauai (with buildings of at least ten stories) has high rises. I have stayed on both Moloka'i and Lana'i, and as far as I know they have so far escaped high rises.

I have taken one NCL-A intra-Hawaii cruise (at a great sale price) done in conjunction with an extended stay on the Big Island, but if it is a choice between one or the other, I vote for land stays.

I agree that to see Hawaii a land tour is best. Since we'd already done that 3 times, we enjoyed our Princess cruise to Hawaii from LA, but probably won't do the roundtrip cruise again.

We like sea days and have done several TA's, but the weather on the sea days on our Hawaii cruise was quite cool, all the way to Hawaii and back. Seas were fine, just cool cloudy days and some rain. I realize this is the luck of the draw, and we knew there would be some cool days, just not all of them.

Love Hawaii and spending quality time on all the islands, not just a few hours.

If you want the cruise experience, flying in a few days early and then taking the NCL cruise would work. Or, there are some 10-11 day one-way cruises, so you'd have fewer sea days. We much prefer to get off Oahu, especially Honolulu, and onto the other islands.

The NCL Pride of America cruise was one of the best ever. That and our RCL Alaska cruise ranks as our best cruises ever. Loved all the islands we were able to visit with POA cruise........ Did not have time to do RCL's sea days, so worked NCL out great for us. Highly recommend.

If you are going with the purpose of seeing Hawaii, you should do a land vacation. It's much easier for Americans than most places that cruise ships sail. If you want to do a cruise with a little bit of Hawaii thrown in, by all meals do the NCLA cruise.

 

Hawaii is all about the Aloha spirit, the relaxed way of life etc. You won't get that on a cruise. There are so many things to do on Hawaii - I've spent several months and have only scratched the surface.

 

If you want to get the best of both worlds, you could do one of the one way cruises that go to or depart Honolulu and do a land vacation before or after your cruise. Radiance of the Seas does two cruises each year in transit between Vancouver and Sydney. Celebrity's Solstice does the same.

There are several Transpacific cruises that Royal does....they are long, I believe 16 days. That is what we will be considering in a few years, when we have the time (after retirement) to do a cruise of that length.