Hiring" Local Drivers"

[lrn376]

Marcyjane, I too have to sit down and start to compare the diff. tours. Have to see who is charging what and what are the destinations and if it fits into the ships schedule. Good thing we have alot of time to work these things out. I think I'm getting obsessed with this. (LOL) I think I will have to take some of the ships excursions just to be on the safe side. We'll see, when I start "investigating"all my papers.

We are from Northern N.J. 20 minutes from NYC which I don't get to, often enough. Paramus is the shopping center of the World. (that's what Paramus people say). We have every major dept. store withing 10 min. of each other. We do not have shopping on Sundays, so the people of Paramus can get a rest from all the traffic that the stores bring. Have a nice weekend. Talk soon. Lois

[sparkle]

Hi Lois and Marcy,

 

I went on the websites for www.koshawaii.com and www.shoretrips.com, both look good. Now instead of no choices, thanks to the threads, we have 3 choices! (along with the discoverhawaiitours.com) Decisions, decisions!:)

 

Hope you all have a great thanksgiving!

Aloha!

[lrn376]

Hi Sparkle.

Thanks for the info. Now we have to find out which is the best company to deal with. Has anyone used any of these tour companies? Would appreciate some info on them. Happy Thanksgiving to you and your. Lois

[nobbync]

Hi Everyone... This thread is coming up at the right time. I am also looking into private tours in Hawaii and thanks for all the information.

 

Our trip isn't for 11 months and will be on the Zaandam roundtrip from San Diego in Oct 07. Too long to wait! Still it's fun to start planning. I will be with my mom for this trip and she is in great health but she just doesn't move around like she used to. We thought about trying to hire a private driver with a custom tour of places we want to see. Thanks for the person that posted about Kos and his Hummer tours. I think we will try that on Oahu but we are going to see about a custom trip because this may be mom's last chance to go to Hawaii. On his website it looks like he can be hired for up to 12 hours so that might be what we'll do. It's expensive but I figure with someone else driving they can take us to places we'd never find on our own. Since we're only in for a day or two in ports we don't want to waste the time looking for places to see.

 

So in my searches I also found Carey Limos http://hawaiilimo.com/ that seem to have tours also. I haven't written them yet but may see if they can pick us up at the ship on Maui.

 

Nobby

[marcyjane]

Thanks again Sparkle and Lois,

 

We are so blessed to have this web site and people like you all that help each other out.

 

Lois, yes we have plenty of time to work on this and I'm too obessed with this as well. I get so mad at myself reading all of this and looking at all the tours web sites I begining to get so confused.

 

My DH would say after I found this site that I have a new boyfriend that he call (cc). I would come in from work and get everything done as soon as I could, supper cook, kitchen cleaned, anything else that need done, then to Cruise Critics I would go. It's been my company for the last few years, and even more when a cruise is booked.

 

Thanks Sparkle for the new web sites for tour information.

 

Hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving

Marcy:)

[marcyjane]

Thanks again Sparkle and Lois,

 

We are so blessed to have this web site and people like you all that help each other out.

 

Lois, yes we have plenty of time to work on this and I'm too obessed with this as well. I get so mad at myself reading all of this and looking at all the tours web sites I begining to get so confused.

 

My DH would say after I found this site that I have a new boyfriend that he call (cc). I would come in from work and get everything done as soon as I could, supper cook, kitchen cleaned, anything else that need done, then to Cruise Critics I would go. It's been my company for the last few years, and even more when a cruise is booked.

 

Thanks Sparkle for the new web sites for tour information.

 

Hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving

Marcy:)

[lrn376]

Hi Anna, were you able to get any contact info on the person that does private tours in Kauai and Oahu? Looking forward to hearing from you about this. Happy Thanksgiving. Lois

[bobsydney]

We would love to do Road to Hana and it sounds too difficult for Aussies.

 

Hi Queensland Girl, not sure if you are still checking this thread, but as a fellow Aussie cruiser, I thought I should let you know that you shouldn't worry too much abot driving on the other side of the road.

 

I too was nervous about doing so, but in the end decided that for some ports it was the best and/or most efficient way of seeing what I wanted to. So I it the bullet and hired cars. Made sure though that the first time was on one of the less populated islands (Kauai and Maui) before I tackled Honolulu/Waikiki.

 

In the event, I had no real problems with driving, I just needed to think about what I was doing a bit more. And if you are following other traffic, that makes it a breeze. The only problems I really had was putting my wipers on instead of the blinkers, and cars whose headlights don't turn off when you turn them off!!

 

Enjoy the experience ... it's all part of doing something different on holidays.

 

Cheers

Bob

[sparkle]

Dear Lois, Marcy and Nobby,

 

Hope you all are doing well.

 

We decided on the Kos Hawaii Circle Island Tour. We contacted Ed, and the date we will be there is available (2/18). Based on the recommendation from reteach, I think it will be a wonderful time, and alot more personal, of course.

He takes 4 people, so we put on our roll call if 2 others would like to join us. His prices for 2007 have gone up (big surprise with the cost of fuel, eh?), so it will be $100 ea/$400 for that tour.

 

Maybe someone will post a review before then, but for sure I will after we go.

 

We hope you all have a very Merry Christmas, and Wonderful cruises in '07!!

 

Aloha!

[sparkle]

Dear Lois, Marcy and Nobby,

 

Hope you all are doing well.

 

We decided on the Kos Hawaii Circle Island Tour. We contacted Ed, and the date we will be there is available (2/18). Based on the recommendation from reteach, I think it will be a wonderful time, and alot more personal, of course.

He takes 4 people, so we put on our roll call if 2 others would like to join us. His prices for 2007 have gone up (big surprise with the cost of fuel, eh?), so it will be $100 ea/$400 for that tour.

 

Maybe someone will post a review before then, but for sure I will after we go.

 

We hope you all have a very Merry Christmas, and Wonderful cruises in '07!!

 

Aloha!

[sparkle]

sorry about the double post, I guess my computer has the hiccups!

[nobbync]

We decided on the Kos Hawaii Circle Island Tour. We contacted Ed, and the date we will be there is available (2/18). Based on the recommendation from reteach, I think it will be a wonderful time, and alot more personal, of course.

He takes 4 people, so we put on our roll call if 2 others would like to join us. His prices for 2007 have gone up (big surprise with the cost of fuel, eh?), so it will be $100 ea/$400 for that tour.

 

Maybe someone will post a review before then, but for sure I will after we go.

 

We hope you all have a very Merry Christmas, and Wonderful cruises in '07!!

 

Aloha!

 

Thanks for letting us know Sparkle and I hope someone also posts a review before you go but if not I am looking forward to hearing how yours went. We'll be with Kos in October, too long to wait so looking forward to hearing your experience.

 

Merry Christmas and happy cruising!

 

Nobby

[sparkle]

Lois, Marcy and Nobby,

 

We had a great time on the Hummer tour. I posted in our roll call and another couple joined us. We did not get Ed Kos himself, which was a little disappointing. But the guy we had, Jeff, was good. I don't think he gave us as much of the history part of things as we would have gotten from Ed, but he took us to all the great places around the island. His specialty is the Movie Tours (info on the website, 2 and 5 hr tours), and he really lit up when we got near locations where movies or TV shows were filmed. Clarence had seen one movie, The Big Bounce, with Morgan Freeman and Charie Sheen, and was happy to see those sites. We stopped for lunch at Haleiwa Joe's, where Morgan Freeman ate in the movie, and the food is great (we did not see most of the movies/shows like 50 First Dates and Lost, but if you take the Movie Tour, they have a DVD player and show clips when you are at those particular places). We went through Wakiki, we went up into Diamond Head (did not hike to the top), went to Haunauma Beach (up top, did not walk down to the beach), the blowhole, Sandy Beach, Sunset Beach to see the surfers, and many other beautiful places. Clarence and Virginia took ALOT of pictures, and he was very accommodating to Photographers, suggesting the best views. On the way back we stopped at the Dole Pineapple Plantation for pineapple ice cream.

Clarence wanted to get pictures of the King Kamehameha Statue, so he took us there before he took us back to the ship. (He picked us up right outside Security where the ship docked). We would recommend this tour. The Hummer was cool, too! :D

 

If you have any other questions, please ask.

Aloha!

[lrn376]

Dear Sparkle, Many thanks for the review. Sorry to hear you didn't get Ed Kos but glad you were happy with Jeff. Sounds like you all had a great time. Lois

[nobbync]

Hi Terry,

 

Thanks so much for the follow up on Kos Tours. I was disapointed to hear that it was not Ed himself that did your tour but good to hear Jeff was also good. When speaking to Ed on the phone he said he was going to do our tour so hope it is the case. He sounded very knowledgable and I have specific places I wanted to stop at and skip a lot of the rest from the regular tour. We have 2 days in Honolulu so the first day I had plans to rent a car and hit all the Waikiki and Honolulu area so I don't need to see that with Kos. As the time gets closer Ed said to send him some emails and we can bounce back some ideas.

 

Did you do the circle island tour and then they did some of the movie places or did you specifically ask for this? How long did you have him for? We booked the private charter for 12 hours and he said we can go anywhere we want to go. It's a little more expensive but I was just wondering if you booked the specific tour if they were still flexible.

 

It sounds like you had a great time and I am really looking forward to our trip. Time is going by fast but not fast enough! Was there any stops on the tour you can see strange birds or other wildlife?

 

Thanks again for the follow up on this. I wish we were going now...

 

Nobby

[sparkle]

Hi Nobby,

 

We did the 8hr circle Island tour, which I think is a regular tour, but seemed there was some flexibility. Jeff asked us if there were any places in paticular we wanted to see, but the only one we requested was the King Kamehameha statue so Clarence could get pictures. We just trusted him to take us to the good places. Last time, we went to the Polynesian Cultural Center, which was wonderful (you would need all or most of a day there), and I think Dennis and Virginia had gone to Pearl Harbor, so we saw very little. None of us had been around the island before. On the way around the island, you pass filming locations, so we did not ask for them, but Jeff told us alot about each one we passed. I don't remember much wildlife, but then we were mostly concentrating on scenery, so there may be. If there is any, I'm sure Ed would take you to see it.

 

Hope this helps. I know you will have a great time!

Aloha!