Been a while since I wrote one of these blog posts! We stayed local, you know, kids needed to finish the school year 🙂

I’ve never been to Hawai’i and of course am overexcited and been planning for months. My National Geographic map spells Hawai’i with the apostrophe so I’m sticking with it, in case you are wondering.

We are starting off our adventure on Oahu, which will be a very long direct flight from Newark, NJ. I’ll let you know how that goes over once we return. Three kids, two with special needs, I’m keeping my expectations low. Like, extremely low.

Oahu

Since we are a six hour time difference from Connecticut to Honolulu, I’m keeping our first full day in Oahu to resort life only. We are staying at the Disney Aulani resort. The resort appears to have days worth of things to do and see but we will have a rental car for wanderings.

One of those wanderings, at the top of my list, is a visit to Pearl Harbor. I also know my children well and will hit up some locations known for tide pools. I want to see amazing white sand/blue water beaches!

We already have a luau booked, one of the activities others have said are a must do in Hawai’i. I’ve heard Disney does an amazing job with authentic Hawaiian culture so we are going to their luau.

Big Island Hawai’i

After six nights on Oahu we are flying over to the big island. I’m super excited to see the islands from the air as we take a small plane between them. Checking off another National Park, Volcanoes National Park is our must do on Hawai’i. We are staying at an Airbnb just outside the park entrance.

This is where we’ll do most of the hiking for our trip. I know there are great hikes on Oahu, any maybe we will do some there too, but the only one I know we are certainly doing is in the National Park.

Black Sand Beach and Green Sand Beach are top sites for me. I’d like to explore around Hilo and/or Kona too.

This is our one big trip for this summer! You can see why; ten days on the other side of the world isn’t cheap. Luckily we are Disney Vacation Club members and are using our points for Aulani, saving a lot of money for this trip.

Any big plans for you???