Hawaiian Islands
Getting Around
Bus
As Honolulu is a major city, Waikiki has a decent bus system that can get you around if you are really on a budget. However, when we hit Pearl Harbor and North Shore, we really enjoyed having a car. Additionally, there is a free "shopping shuttle" that will take you to specific shopping destinations around Honolulu.
Rental Cars
Major rental car companies (including Avis and Hertz) have rental stations at the airports as well as along major neighborhoods on Oahu and Maui (including Waikiki, along Kalakua Ave). On Maui specifically, we had a great experience with Kihei Rent-A-Car, who picked us up at the airport and brought us back. We found their rates to be 15% below the larger companies.
To get the best price, we recommend shopping around for rental cars online: most allow you to cancel a reservation at the last minute without a cancellation fee. So shop around until you find the best rate. Also, since there are local pickups/dropoffs at points of interest, we recommend only booking the car for the days that you'll need it: most hotels will charge per night for parking.
One warning: we had a bad experience with Avis in Oahu. When we picked up the car, they incorrectly told us that we could drop off the car in the early morning (we had a 5:00 AM flight out). Much to our chagrin, we arrived to a closed airport Avis with no dropoff. Avis customer service was not helpful and we ended up walking to the airport from the closed Avis location.
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