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Old 25 Jul 20, 11:04 PM  
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Gryff
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Join Date: Jun 14
Big Island Hawaii

We absolutely loved Honolulu earlier this year even looked at buying a home the climate suited us beyond belief but even a tiny apartment was just beyond us
So has anyone been to the big island the beach is not our priority just things to do our only blip in Honolulu was trying to get fresh meat something fvwed been there longer we’d have solved
We really don’t do hotels more than 3 nights
Eagerly waiting suggestions recommended accomadation things todo etc
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Old 25 Jul 20, 11:40 PM  
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KarenG
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Only for a week but it’s a very unusual place! It has something like seven different microclimates on the island. The west and the east side are very very different in terms of weather / terrain. Stunning scenery.

You would need a car as basically there is no public transport / very few taxis. Cars often sell out for rental at peak times.

We like to stay somewhere where we can walk to places and struggled with that a lot.

We found accommodation there cheaper than Maui but more expensive than Waikiki Beach.

There are many condos and not a huge amount of hotels. We ended up with a two bedroom condo despite that being too big for us as one bedrooms either didn’t exist or were not available.

The scenery is as you’d expect very verdant in places and volcanic ash in others. A bit other worldly.

We found food prices extremely expensive, much worse than Waikiki Beach for grocery shopping comparatively.
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Old 25 Jul 20, 11:57 PM  
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Gryff
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Karen
Thankyou so much
If I’m totally honest it was+the airport that just hooked us in to look further
We found eating out / food shopping on a par with Florida in Honolulu
We’d been in San Francisco the week before and eating out for just a basic meal was expensive
We had a trader Joes by the hotel room has a microwave good size fridge coffee machine and I had. Plates bowls cutlery sharp knife or Florida kettle and toaster etc with us and the hotel did a decent early dinner menu in SF
It certainly be self catering for us. And a bit of space after 38 years we know what just won’t work me as much as DH
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Old 26 Jul 20, 10:07 AM  
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KarenG
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Originally Posted by Gryff View Post
Karen
Thankyou so much
If I’m totally honest it was+the airport that just hooked us in to look further
We found eating out / food shopping on a par with Florida in Honolulu
We’d been in San Francisco the week before and eating out for just a basic meal was expensive
We had a trader Joes by the hotel room has a microwave good size fridge coffee machine and I had. Plates bowls cutlery sharp knife or Florida kettle and toaster etc with us and the hotel did a decent early dinner menu in SF
It certainly be self catering for us. And a bit of space after 38 years we know what just won’t work me as much as DH
Oh my goodness the airport 😂

I guess you mean Kona rather than Hilo (we flew in and out of Kona which was a 25 drive from our condo). It is the most bizarre airport ever!

We stayed on the Kohala Coast, which was close to the beaches (we couldn’t afford a condo on the beach) but basically you have to drive everywhere. There was a Target and Walmart in Kona but we mostly shopped at the local grocery store which quite upmarket (think mini Waitrose/Whole Foods) with prices to match. $14.99 for a small frozen pizza for example. There was a really good range of cheese, meat, fish and of course amazing seafood which was cheap compared to the frozen pizza 😂

We did lots day trips - the island is stunning - let me know if you want me to list them out
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Old 26 Jul 20, 10:13 AM  
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KarenG
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So the condo we rented doesn’t seem to be listed any more but here is one on the same complex - it was gated and about a half mile walk down a quiet road (no street lights though) to a small area of shops and restaurants:

paradiseinhawaii/Sec...picalHideaway/

Our condo was on two floors with the master bath and bedroom upstairs (massive) and a huge open plan living / dining / kitchen area downstairs, bathroom and bedroom also downstairs (but we never used them) and washer dryer. We had two Lanais, one off the dining area downstairs and one upstairs off the master. It’s set on a golf course so lots of green to look at!

We found this complex the cheapest in the area but (I know you said you’re not bothered by beaches) it comes with a free pass to the Mauna Lani Beach Club which seemed a highly attractive thing to most of the people who rented it.
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Old 26 Jul 20, 01:43 PM  
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paw
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We went a long time ago when everyone was doing book two weeks and get the third free. As part of that package we got 4 days in Toronto, 2 days in Honolulu, 4 days in Vancouver and the rest in Kona, at the Royal Kona Resort.

We loved Big Island, had a car and travelled all over. On the days we weren’t touring we headed North to the beaches. We were within walking distance of lots of places to eat but then most places closed around 9 including the hotel which was a shock, there is a Hard Rock across the road. But there was always a long queue so we tended to eat at the little places on the beach. There is a Walmart on the hill behind the resort, and a McDonalds with great views of the coast. We ate out every day, 3 meals a day, and found lots of reasonably priced places. The only place that we found expensive was Honolulu where it was cheaper to get a meal in the hotel restaurant than the Denny’s nearby.

I don’t know if the airport has improved but it was more like an American bus station, or little UK train station. We arrived early to find you handed your luggage through a gate in a wire fence and waited next to it as that was The gate. It was bucketing down and both us and our luggage were soaked.
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