One day - Pearl Harbor & Kuaola Ranch

[ebenmax]

My DS (27) will be joining us for 2 days during our week at Aulani. One day we have reserved the Executive Lanai and plan to spend the day at Aulani (maybe dinner elsewhere but...) And the other day he wants to see Pearl Harbor and Kualoa Ranch (movie buff). Is it possible to see both of these places in one day?
If so, how would you plan to get the most of the time? It will be a Wednesday.

Thank you!

 

[cgattis]

I think it's totally do-able, but you have to have luck on your side. It will depend on what time your PH tix are. If you draw early morning tix, no prob. Leave to beat rush hour, do PH, then head to Kualoa for a mid-afternoon tour.

Now, if you draw afternoon PH tix, you just reverse that. But, there is a chance that the afternoon winds pick up and the boat shuts down, keeping you from going out to the memorial (although you'd still see the museums). Of course, that could always happen in the morning too, but it's a little less likely.

Here is where you really need a local to give you the details of the usual traffic patterns. Also, I chose PH in the morning so I didn't go all dirty and smelly from another activity, but that's really not super-important; people will be there in all states of cleanliness and dress LOL.

The tricky part is the tix only come out 60 days in advance. (They also release some the day before, as a backup plan.) I don't know how far out Kualoa tours book up or if they even do; they have lots to choose from. Good luck; hopefully you can make it work.

 

[ebenmax]

I think it's totally do-able, but you have to have luck on your side. It will depend on what time your PH tix are. If you draw early morning tix, no prob. Leave to beat rush hour, do PH, then head to Kualoa for a mid-afternoon tour.

Now, if you draw afternoon PH tix, you just reverse that. But, there is a chance that the afternoon winds pick up and the boat shuts down, keeping you from going out to the memorial (although you'd still see the museums). Of course, that could always happen in the morning too, but it's a little less likely.

Here is where you really need a local to give you the details of the usual traffic patterns. Also, I chose PH in the morning so I didn't go all dirty and smelly from another activity, but that's really not super-important; people will be there in all states of cleanliness and dress LOL.

The tricky part is the tix only come out 60 days in advance. (They also release some the day before, as a backup plan.) I don't know how far out Kualoa tours book up or if they even do; they have lots to choose from. Good luck; hopefully you can make it work.

I know Pearl Harbor tickets are set for a certain time. Is that time connected to all of the Pearl Harbor sites or is it for the memorial?
So for example could we start out early touring the museums before the memorial (since I’ve read most people can’t get one before 11:00 unless it’s a scheduled tour company), and then do the memorial at say 11:00 or shortly after? Then be off to Kualoa by 1:00 or so?

I hope that makes sense...

 

[trs518]

I know Pearl Harbor tickets are set for a certain time. Is that time connected to all of the Pearl Harbor sites or is it for the memorial?
So for example could we start out early touring the museums before the memorial (since I’ve read most people can’t get one before 11:00 unless it’s a scheduled tour company), and then do the memorial at say 11:00 or shortly after? Then be off to Kualoa by 1:00 or so?

I hope that makes sense...

The time on the tickets is for the boat ride out to the memorial. People can do the rest either before or after.

 

[Avery&Todd]

So we did this trip this past April!!! We ended up spending a day at each place - but I'll tell you why/how..

First day was at Pearl Harbour - DH got online the day he was able to get tickets and the earliest tickets for the memorial were like at 12:00pm!! So, we decided to go ahead and be there when the gates opened at like 8am - so we go up to the counter to check and the guy said "I see you have a tour for 12pm, would you like an earlier one? We have space open in our 8:30 am tour"! YES AND SCORE AND BINGO!!!

so, we did the memorial tour FIRST and then the rest of the exhibit - we did IT ALL! We took the bus over to the other ship on Ford Island, we wen to the airplane exhibit (not impressed), we toured the submarine, we did IT ALL and we didnt not leave until almost 5pm that day - it was EXHAUSTING!!!

but so worth spending a whole day.

Then we'd booked an activities package at Kualoa Ranch - it POURED rain while we were there...got there first thing in the morning and we had a jungle tour, the movie set tour, the ATV tour and the horseback riding.....and lunch with included - it was the BEST day ever...even in the rain....lucky for us for the ATV ride it did not rain, but it POURED while riding the horses....

any other questions????

 

[cgattis]

I know Pearl Harbor tickets are set for a certain time. Is that time connected to all of the Pearl Harbor sites or is it for the memorial?
So for example could we start out early touring the museums before the memorial (since I’ve read most people can’t get one before 11:00 unless it’s a scheduled tour company), and then do the memorial at say 11:00 or shortly after? Then be off to Kualoa by 1:00 or so?

I hope that makes sense...

Yes, you can do it in that order. I'm not sure the actual drive time to Kualoa, and you'd prob want to grab some lunch too. Not sure what the latest tour at Kualoa is, but it may still be doable with an 11 ticket (which was the first available for us). You can be done in an hour from your ticket time IIRC. About a 25 minute movie, 5 minute boat ride, 15 min out there, and 5 minute back, I'd say. If you do all your touring and any shopping before, you could be out by noonish.

We found a pretty darn good BBQ (not Hawaiian, southern BBQ) very near there (Dixie BBQ) that I recommend if you have time.

 

[buffettgirl]

I would say try to do Pearl Harbor in the morning. Tour the grounds, get a boat ticket for about 11 or so. Eat lunch. Then go to Kualoa.

Which ever you do you're going to hit traffic at some point. Leaving Aulani and heading east on H1, if you try to head out too early, you'll hit morning rush hour. Your best bet is to wait till about 9 to leave, you'll get to Pearl Harbor in about 30 min. If not, you're going to hit all the rush hour morning traffic coming from Kapolei and Ewa, and then you're going to hit traffic where H2 and H1 merge, bringing int he commuters from the north. If you go to Kualoa first, you have to get on H3 - basically right at the back end of pearl harbor. That will be your easy part, you won't hit much traffic at all going to the windward side in the morning. It will still take you about an hour.

Coming home, no matter what you've done, you'll hit traffic on the H1 heading back to Aulani from about 3:30 onward. You've got no way to avoid it.

All that said, you can still just tour the grounds at the Arizaona Memorial without a ticket. And, I've yet to have an issue getting a late afternoon ticket (and a parking spot) either as a walk up that day, or online the day before.