Pearl Harbor

We will be taking the 15 day Hawaii cruise out of Los Angeles. The Pearl Harbor excursions offered by Princess are sold out. Does anyone know of independent operators offering good excursions who will pick us up at the ship? Thanks

Why not do it on your own. You can get on a bus not too far from where the ship docks and it will drop you off right at the entrance. Information on how to get there by bus can be found at http://www.thebus.org/.

I agree with the do it yourself idea. Otherwise, the largest and most commonly mentioned tour vendor on this board is Roberts.

Or if want a more personalized adventure use Uber it's alive and well here on Oahu. Enjoy your visit.

Aloha,

Will

Doing a visit on your own is a great way... But keep in mind there may not be any places left to visit the over water monument. Many tour operators buy these tickets-up. Thus leaving few left for independent visitors. Also it is not uncommon for people to line up before the site opens just to ensure they get a ticket for the monument.

Also remember, even if you get a monument ticket.... It may be for a slot several hours later in the day.... Do you want to hang around for many hours.

I would book a visit on line well before your visit date. You can do this on the Pearl Harbour website.

if you go on your own you can reserve tickets two months out or they have 1000 tickets available day of visit. Here's the link

http://www.nps.gov/valr/planyourvisit/fees.htm

if you go on your own you can reserve tickets two months out or they have 1000 tickets available day of visit. Here's the link

 

http://www.nps.gov/valr/planyourvisit/fees.htm

Click the link above and reserve tickets.

Then use Uber, TheBus or a cab to get to Pearl Harbor for the USS Arizona Memorial. Anything else you do at PH is gravy.

Good news about the 1000 tickets per day.. [emoji106]🏻

There is a wonderful company called Home Of The Brave.

I think you can learn a lot more from a tour having done it both ways.

Here is the link to their web site:

http://www.homeofthebravetours.com

They are just outstanding.

Keith

Thanks Keith 1010. I've checked out the website... Looks a great trip and something I'll look into for my 2017 visit...

But I'm not so sure about the 0545hrs start time though...🛌

Thanks Keith 1010. I've checked out the website... Looks a great trip and something I'll look into for my 2017 visit...

But I'm not so sure about the 0545hrs start time though...🛌

Keep in mind the time change. If you do this at the beginning of the trip, you may be getting up that early anyway. We really wanted to do Home of the Brave, but we visited PH on New Year's Eve, and HotB didn't offer tours that day. We had a fun time on our own, but I was really hoping to do the tour. Seems very immersive, and the TA reviews are outstanding.

Thanks Keith 1010. I've checked out the website... Looks a great trip and something I'll look into for my 2017 visit...

But I'm not so sure about the 0545hrs start time though...🛌

That early start is what made us decide not to use E Noa tours and explore on our own. I may be up early but I want to spend that time relaxing, drinking coffee and eating malasadas. Not bouncing around in someone's van. :p

Home of the Brave doesn't do weekends.

if you go on your own you can reserve tickets two months out or they have 1000 tickets available day of visit. Here's the link

 

http://www.nps.gov/valr/planyourvisit/fees.htm

Good info here, thanx much!

We used Discover Hawaii Tours.

http://www.discoverhawaiitours.com/hawaii-tours/pearl-harbor-tours/

Excellent tour and guide.

if you go on your own you can reserve tickets two months out or they have 1000 tickets available day of visit. Here's the link

 

http://www.nps.gov/valr/planyourvisit/fees.htm

Thanks Keith 1010. I've checked out the website... Looks a great trip and something I'll look into for my 2017 visit...

But I'm not so sure about the 0545hrs start time though...🛌

Is this two months out info on ticket availability still true? I thought I had seen that tickets now must be booked no more than 24 hours in advance, which would make this difficult if you are also traveling to Hawaii, or on a cruise, at that time. It was confusing to me, which is the main reason we booked a tour. They take care of the tickets, so that's one less thing we have to worry about.

As far as the early start, I say this is perfect. You are probably on Mainland time anyway, so at 6 am your body thinks it's 11:00 am. Pearl Harbor gets crowded. And it gets hot. Get there early. You'll be back at the hotel for lunch and a full afternoon relaxing or seeing the sights.

Is this two months out info on ticket availability still true? I thought I had seen that tickets now must be booked no more than 24 hours in advance, which would make this difficult if you are also traveling to Hawaii, or on a cruise, at that time. It was confusing to me, which is the main reason we booked a tour. They take care of the tickets, so that's one less thing we have to worry about.

 

As far as the early start, I say this is perfect. You are probably on Mainland time anyway, so at 6 am your body thinks it's 11:00 am. Pearl Harbor gets crowded. And it gets hot. Get there early. You'll be back at the hotel for lunch and a full afternoon relaxing or seeing the sights.

I googled the Memorial's reservation options three weeks ago and was brought to the site that allowed reservations 60 days out. Though possible, I would not expect it has changed in three weeks. But if you do a similar search, you can confirm my info.

Hi all, I am also looking into doing this on our own in October when we cruise with Carnival. But I'm not sure about the timing and could sure use some help! We will be docking at 9am........but not sure how long it will take to get off the ship, or how long it will take to get from the ship to Pearl Harbor so, not sure what time frame to get the tickets for. We would need to get it as early as we can because of another tour later in the day. If someone that knows the area could give me some idea of the time factor here I would be most grateful!! We have a luau pick up at 3:30 and my son and husband wanted to at least see Waikiki Beack in between the two. Thanks for any help you can give me!

Is this two months out info on ticket availability still true? I thought I had seen that tickets now must be booked no more than 24 hours in advance, which would make this difficult if you are also traveling to Hawaii, or on a cruise, at that time. It was confusing to me, which is the main reason we booked a tour. They take care of the tickets, so that's one less thing we have to worry about.

 

As far as the early start, I say this is perfect. You are probably on Mainland time anyway, so at 6 am your body thinks it's 11:00 am. Pearl Harbor gets crowded. And it gets hot. Get there early. You'll be back at the hotel for lunch and a full afternoon relaxing or seeing the sights.

Not sure where you got that information. I just tried a mock booking about 2 months out and there were tickets available.

Not sure where you got that information. I just tried a mock booking about 2 months out and there were tickets available.

I guess I must have been seeing posts about those tickets which are released daily at 7:00 am for 24 hours in advance, or the walk in, first come first served same day tx released at 7:00 am daily for those who did not book 2 months out.

I'm not sure how far out we were when we decided to see PH on embark day. I wonder how successful we would have been trying to get tx on our own had we not booked with Roberts. We had a very narrow window of opportunity for a few hours on the am of one day only. I would have been very disappointed if my ticket time had ended up being 4:00 in the afternoon.

Not sure why someone who would like to see PH on their own would book through a tour. At $1.50 a ticket, you can make more than one reservation and still come out ahead and do PH at your leisure. My favorite time still remains the last tours of the day when most of the "got to get there early" visitors are gone and there is a beautiful quiet that comes over the memorial. This, of course, is just my opinion. I have also been able to get tickets when wanted, whether purchasing ahead or just showing up. However, on occasion, the winds pick up in the afternoon and boats to the memorial are stopped. I do not love being in the middle of hundreds of tourists so we still opt for late afternoon tickets. JMO Cherie

Not sure why someone who would like to see PH on their own would book through a tour. At $1.50 a ticket, you can make more than one reservation and still come out ahead and do PH at your leisure. My favorite time still remains the last tours of the day when most of the "got to get there early" visitors are gone and there is a beautiful quiet that comes over the memorial. This, of course, is just my opinion. I have also been able to get tickets when wanted, whether purchasing ahead or just showing up. However, on occasion, the winds pick up in the afternoon and boats to the memorial are stopped. I do not love being in the middle of hundreds of tourists so we still opt for late afternoon tickets. JMO Cherie

Not everyone has the luxury of doing PH "at their leisure". As far as cost, as I recall, the cost of our tour with Roberts did not much exceed the cost of a roundtrip taxi ride, which would have been needed had we gotten tickets on our own. And no, I am not going to ride "the bus".

Because we flew in the day before our cruise, we had a very narrow window of opportunity for PH which was the following morning followed in the early afternoon by boarding a cruise ship. Not going to chance showing up at the gate only to be told our assigned Arizona time would be 3:00 pm which would have made it impossible to get to the cruise on time. And even booking in advance via the website, if you are already beyond the 2 month out window when you begin to research a PH tour, an advance ticket for a specific time and date might not be available either.

The easy solution was the PH/Punchbowl/City Tour. They were able to guarantee our first thing in the am tickets. Easy pickup at the hotel. We were on our own inside the gates to wander where we pleased except to conform to the Arizona tour time on the ticket. After PH, we saw Punchbowl and stopped at Iolani Palace and King Kam statue. Almost guarantee we would not have seen these things in that narrow time frame without the tour. I am often a do it yourselfer, but there are times a tour can make things possible.

punkincc - So happy to hear that you enjoyed your tour of PH, Punchbowl, Iolani Palace, King Kam statue, and city tour with Roberts. It is amazing how much they can include in one morning. Great. How was the tour of the Iolani? It is one of my favorites, so beautiful and so much history.

Yes, not everyone has the opportunity to get their tickets two months in advance, and may not want to take a chance on arriving at PH and not getting in. Possibly someone who has tried getting tickets on-line and all 1000 pre sold tickets were gone could let us know when they tried for tickets and found them unavailable.

Hopefully there are many tour options that are available that may not include drive bys of several locations, if they just want to see PH. My response to this thread was for those who would rather see PH on their own. There have been some very good suggestions regarding transportation options. The good thing is that there is probably something for everyone.

I wish you a very happy visit on your next trip to Hawaii, I know we are looking forward to ours. Cherie

Check out Viator through Tripadvisor.

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Check out Viator through Tripadvisor.

 

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No, don't check out Viator. All they do is third party book with people like Roberts. Stick with the original vendor.