Hawaii Trip Retrospective
Now that I've caught up on blogging about our trip to Hawaii this month- I posted the final entry earlier today- it's time for a retrospective about the trip. Yes, I'm had plenty of time to reflect on the trip already. Even though I just finished blogging about it, we finished the actual trip six days ago. (This kind of backlog is typical. 😅) Here are Five Things:
1) We packed accurately. I've written before about the pitfalls of overpacking. Travel magazines say that the average vacationer overpacks by 5 changes of clothes. Times even just 2 people that's like an extra suitcase, yikes! I wore every shirt and pair of shorts I packed, nothing wasted nothing wanting. We probably could have saved carrying several articles of clothing each if I'd remembered our timeshare in Waikoloa had a washing machine in the apartment. I don't think that would've made the difference of carrying one less suitcase, but we sure could have downsized one of our medium bags to a small bag.
2) We planned the right amount of time. This trip we spent 4 nights on Oahu, 5 on the big island of Hawaii. While hopping around does tend to be our style, the downside to it can be not spending enough time in any one place to see enough of the great things it has to offer. These were the right amounts of time... because we've visited both islands before. We had 5 nights on Oahu back in December, and we had a short visit to Hawaii a few years ago. If we hadn't been there before, a solid week on one island would've been the right amount of time.
3) Fine-tuning what to look for in a hotel. There are certain things we routinely look for in a hotel. We always scrutinize location, of course. We look for a decent hot tub because we enjoy soaking in hot tubs to relax. We check for whether a refrigerator and microwave are standard in the room. These all checked out fine when we chose the Holiday Inn Express in Waikiki.... But one thing we really missed was a balcony. For most trips a balcony is purely a nice-to-have. For resort-y vacation trips it's a lot more important.
4) Having a one-bedroom apartment rocked. In the past I've been take-it-or-leave-it about having the greater space that (usually) comes with a vacation rental vs. a typical hotel room. This trip, the one-bedroom apartment we had in a timeshare in Waikoloa was awesome. The full kitchen with full-size fridge made it easy to shop for and prepare meals in the room; the breakfast table was both a comfortable place to eat and a comfortable place to use our computers; and the sofa in the living room was great to stretch out on, with or without something playing on the big TV. The location a mile from the beach was still a major disappointment, but the suite was nice. And it had a balcony we used every day.
5) Taking the earlier flight home was right. I mentioned in the last few blogs that our flight home on Sunday required getting up at 6am to dress, eat breakfast, drive to the airport, etc. We seriously considered taking a flight 3 hours later; it would have let us take it easier our last day in Hawaii. But leaving 3 hours earlier left us 3 hours more to take it easy once we got home. We ate dinner in our own dining room, unpacked our suitcases, started a load of laundry, unwound from 9 days of travel, and got to bed at a reasonable hour. That helped us beat the 3 hour time zone change to get up early Monday morning ready for a full workweek. When we've rocketed home late at night on other trips we've been left feeling we're behind the next several days. I remember at least one time we got home late on a Sunday night and didn't unpack our suitcases until Thursday!
The success with coming home earlier this time validates the plan I have for a week-long trip in July to come home a full day early. We'll rocket home with a late night flight; but it will be Saturday night. We'll have all day Sunday to relax, unpack, clean up, and get back into the groove for work the following week.
1) We packed accurately. I've written before about the pitfalls of overpacking. Travel magazines say that the average vacationer overpacks by 5 changes of clothes. Times even just 2 people that's like an extra suitcase, yikes! I wore every shirt and pair of shorts I packed, nothing wasted nothing wanting. We probably could have saved carrying several articles of clothing each if I'd remembered our timeshare in Waikoloa had a washing machine in the apartment. I don't think that would've made the difference of carrying one less suitcase, but we sure could have downsized one of our medium bags to a small bag.
2) We planned the right amount of time. This trip we spent 4 nights on Oahu, 5 on the big island of Hawaii. While hopping around does tend to be our style, the downside to it can be not spending enough time in any one place to see enough of the great things it has to offer. These were the right amounts of time... because we've visited both islands before. We had 5 nights on Oahu back in December, and we had a short visit to Hawaii a few years ago. If we hadn't been there before, a solid week on one island would've been the right amount of time.
3) Fine-tuning what to look for in a hotel. There are certain things we routinely look for in a hotel. We always scrutinize location, of course. We look for a decent hot tub because we enjoy soaking in hot tubs to relax. We check for whether a refrigerator and microwave are standard in the room. These all checked out fine when we chose the Holiday Inn Express in Waikiki.... But one thing we really missed was a balcony. For most trips a balcony is purely a nice-to-have. For resort-y vacation trips it's a lot more important.
4) Having a one-bedroom apartment rocked. In the past I've been take-it-or-leave-it about having the greater space that (usually) comes with a vacation rental vs. a typical hotel room. This trip, the one-bedroom apartment we had in a timeshare in Waikoloa was awesome. The full kitchen with full-size fridge made it easy to shop for and prepare meals in the room; the breakfast table was both a comfortable place to eat and a comfortable place to use our computers; and the sofa in the living room was great to stretch out on, with or without something playing on the big TV. The location a mile from the beach was still a major disappointment, but the suite was nice. And it had a balcony we used every day.
5) Taking the earlier flight home was right. I mentioned in the last few blogs that our flight home on Sunday required getting up at 6am to dress, eat breakfast, drive to the airport, etc. We seriously considered taking a flight 3 hours later; it would have let us take it easier our last day in Hawaii. But leaving 3 hours earlier left us 3 hours more to take it easy once we got home. We ate dinner in our own dining room, unpacked our suitcases, started a load of laundry, unwound from 9 days of travel, and got to bed at a reasonable hour. That helped us beat the 3 hour time zone change to get up early Monday morning ready for a full workweek. When we've rocketed home late at night on other trips we've been left feeling we're behind the next several days. I remember at least one time we got home late on a Sunday night and didn't unpack our suitcases until Thursday!
The success with coming home earlier this time validates the plan I have for a week-long trip in July to come home a full day early. We'll rocket home with a late night flight; but it will be Saturday night. We'll have all day Sunday to relax, unpack, clean up, and get back into the groove for work the following week.