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#960412 by sjcraythorne
12 Nov 2022, 12:19
Hi All,
Considering a trip to Hawaii next year or 2024. Trying to figure out options to use miles to my best advantage and how many I would need etc. Any ideas where to start or where to look for advice? I've the tax advantage of being able to ex Dublin as I live in NI. My initial thoughts were to fly DUB-LAX then using Hawaiian and miles to fly on to Honolulu.

Any thoughts? Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks, Steve
#960413 by CommanderB
12 Nov 2022, 14:06
I don't have experience using VS points to book Hawaiian Airlines flights. But as it is with all VS partners... I'd expect it to be difficult.

Routings, you could do via LAX as you say. I think SFO or SEA would also be possible but I haven't checked. You could also consider US east coast - BOS, IAD and JFK.

BOS to Honolulu is the longest domestic flight in the world I think. So there's something cool to be said about that.

Good luck! I'd be really interested to know how you do this, as it's been on my points wish list as well.
#960414 by mikethe3rd
12 Nov 2022, 15:19
Your easiest option for using VS points is Delta from LAX to HNL. You can just use the VS website to search. I’ve found economy one way seats for 15,000 + $5. I couldn’t find any J easily enough to give you a comparison.
#960417 by markyl
13 Nov 2022, 23:22
Hawaiian also fly out of Long Beach Airport if you want to avoid LAX
#960423 by AlphaEcho
14 Nov 2022, 13:49
Hi,

I've only ever used miles to grab Virgin flights when heading to Hawaii, but options for you which I have done in the past for flight considerations out of the West Coast are:

SFO - HNL
OAK - HNL
LAX - HNL
SEA - HNL

Hawaiian flights out of Oakland are much cheaper than out of SFO and you can use the BART to transfer directly from SFO to OAK and then get your hotel shuttle from OAK, however I found the hotels around OAK to be a bit run down, but its a way to cut down on the overall cost.

Don't forget to look at other options as to your arrival destination into Hawaii, don't limit yourself to HNL, look at Maui or Lihue both of which have mainland flights direct from the West Coast with Hawaiian Airlines, if they tie in with your itinerary as to the island you're staying on, otherwise inter-island flights with Hawaiian are very easy and you just stay airside at HNL upon arrival.

I prefer to travel out of SFO as I just like the area more than LAX or SEA. Also look at options for the flights, in to any of the places I listed above but out of Hawaii don't necessarily look at going to the same as you originated from, there can be differences in the flight prices that make it worthwhile, I've done into SEA and return from SFO, as well as into LAX and return from SFO.

Transferring from LAX to SFO or vice versa is very easy with loads of flights and I've even thrown in mileage runs in the past between the 2 just to grab tier points before my flight back to the UK.

One piece of advice I would say if it's a first time trip, don't attempt to do the entire journey in one go, it's a killer (especially if its all in Economy as my first time was). First time to Hawaii I did LHR - LAX - LIH with only a 2 hour connection in LAX it was doable but with total journey time of 17:30 (inc the layover) and then collecting your hire care and driving somewhere you had no knowledge of wasn't that enjoyable.

The return journey was even worse, kicked out of the condo at midday with a flight not scheduled until 11pm from OGG to SFO getting in at 5:30am then just hanging around for an early afternoon departure arriving LHR early the following morning. Never to be repeated.

Every time I go now I always break it up, overnight in SFO, LAX, SEA on the wayout and definitely do the same coming back. Now I get a flight around lunchtime out of Hawaii getting you back onto the mainland just after 9pm. Then you can spend a more relaxing time before a flight the following day back to UK.

That way you don't feel the need for another holiday just to get over the flights.

If you book any flights directly with Hawaiian Airlines you will have to contact them to get your Flying Club number on your booking as their website wont accept it. Flying Club members get tier points on the flights from the mainland to Hawaii in all classes and if you're in First on the Inter Island flights you also get them, mileage points are awarded for all flights.

Enjoy yourself, and I really hope the car hire prices come down, currently they're ridiculous and I'm looking at £2k for my 3 weeks there next year, who knows how much food prices will be as it's my first time back in a few years!
#960425 by muppster
14 Nov 2022, 20:09
I've done Hawaiian from Las Vegas too.....just another option to throw into the mix!

3x daily LAS-HNL and 1x LAS-OGG early in the morning.
#960428 by DragonLady
15 Nov 2022, 12:31
muppster wrote:I've done Hawaiian from Las Vegas too.....just another option to throw into the mix!

3x daily LAS-HNL and 1x LAS-OGG early in the morning.


I've flown from LAS to OGG and then back from HNL to LAX with Hawaiian with the short OGG - HNL hop in between. After the madness of Vegas a week in Maui just relaxing was fabulous :)
#960478 by RyanJW
21 Nov 2022, 00:20
Brit living in California and the SF Bay Area to be exact.

You should also look at SJC to HNL, we’ve flown that route a lot so I would suggest getting yourself over to SFO and then checking both Southwest and Alaska as they fly from SJC and it’s only 45 mins south of SFO and tends to be cheaper. Hawaiian also fly from SJC.
We have DVC at Aulani so I’ve done a lot of flight comparisons lately.

As said above, break up the journey to get used to the time zone changes. Hawaii is also 3 hours behind West Coasts 8 hours so being 11 hours behind was a killer for my parents jet lag.
#960485 by deep_south
22 Nov 2022, 11:04
I second the suggestion to break the journey if you can.

We went to Hawaii back in February from Newcastle, it had been delayed 3 times due to covid. In the end, we planned each step to take a day (Newcastle> Heathrow, Heathrow > LAX, LAX > Honolulu) with a night in a hotel at each stage. This was mainly so could sort out any Covid testing. In the 3nd we only needed one to get into the US as Hawaii had dropped its own Covid test requirement by then.

But a pleasant side effect was that we were hardly affected by jetlag. It took 3 days to get there but we had no time constraints and we treated it as part of the holiday.

BA actually offered an itinerary that did it all 8n one day but I think that would be somewhat hard to do!
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