MilesBuzz! - Planning a trip CLT/RDU to Hawaii May 2013

I'm planning a trip to Hawaii for next May, and would love advice on what mile plan I should focus on. Here's what I have so far...

I live in NC, closest airport is Charlotte or Raleigh. I have Southwest points and a companion pass, so I usually go out of Raleigh. So to get to Hawaii, I have no problems using SW to get me to California (or wherever) if that makes things easier/cheaper.
I have lots of family all over in California, so finding a place to stay there is no problem, if necessary. In fact, I would consider it a bonus.

Other than that, I have squat. I've just recently started learning about traveling with miles, and I'm very excited about it. I've got a trip to Niagara Falls booked this fall. :)

Since I recently got 2 Southwest cards through Chase, I am not sure if they will give me another one anytime soon.

I am also not a big spender. I was able to get the companion pass because I used my personal card to make some large purchases for my Girl Scout Troop which recently traveled to Washington DC. But that opportunity is over, and it will be a while before I can use that trick again to get spending up.

I will be going to Waikiki for a conference for 3 days. Other than that, I have nothing planned - still have to figure out where and what we want to do.

Any thoughts or advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
JoAnne

You can get the Alaska Airlines card - you have to pay the annual fee up front but you get a companion pass right away. I used mine for our trip to Hawaii in October - first class. We go from Austin, TX to Seattle to spend a couple of nights, to Honolulu for a week, then back to Seattle etc. Alaska flies to Hawaii from several places in California as well.

You might want to check the markets that Allegiant Air serves to HNL which includes some in California as well as Las Vegas. While you might not want to fly Allegiant, you may find that other airlines are fare matching their HNL deals and be able to score a good deal on Hawaiian, Delta, United, etc.

Fares from California to Hawaii in May vary between $450-650 (sometimes a bit more), but you can sometimes find sales in the $300s; I have not seen one of those in some time but keep a watch out. The best deals seem to be from LAX, OAK and sometimes SAN. LAX has many daily HNL flights which is convenient for planning purposes.

You may find it only a bit more expensive to fly from your home market and avoid the complexity of getting to California. Search for fare examples on ITA (http://www.itasoftware.com, a wonderful airfare search engine) to see if you can put something together that works for your travel dates. I did a basic search for next May and found fares from SoCal in the $590 range, and fares from RDU/CLT in the $800 range. It may be better to just take a one-stop flight from your home airport.

OP, how many people are traveling? It looks like it's two, because you reference using the companion pass, but if you can clarify that'd be great.

The real challenge is finding out who will have availability when you have the miles - award inventory may change between when you apply and when you get the miles. So you may need to think about that and apply for several cards at once to hedge your bets.

My first suggestion would be Chase British Airways card. You can get a RT ticket from California to Hawaii for 25K miles pp. With the current offer you get 50K miles after the first purchase, which is enough for 2 RT tickets. I know you said you wanted to avoid Chase apps though, so that's something you'll have to decide for yourself.

I'd also suggest applying for Ink Bold - it is a Chase business card so you can apply for it at the same as the BA card. It will net you 40K points. You can then transfer to United for two one-way tickets to Hawaii.

Finally, you can apply for the Citi AA cards, which I believe will give you 50K (per card - you can apply up to 2 cards at a time). With at least 50K, you'll have enough for 2 one-way tickets as well.

Between these three cards, you should have enough flexibility to find something from either NC or CA to Hawaii, using several airlines. Of course, I didn't take into account the minimum spend on the Ink Bold and Citi AA cards (as I don't know them off the top of my head).

Get the Hawaiian Airlines credit cards: bank of america and bank of hawaii, each offers 35000 miles on $1000 spend within 3 months with an annual fee of $79. That should get you 70000 miles. Round trip tickets typically cost 40,000 miles. You fly out of Raleigh with Hawaiian.

Get the Hawaiian Airlines credit cards: bank of america and bank of hawaii, each offers 35000 miles on $1000 spend within 3 months with an annual fee of $79. That should get you 70000 miles. Round trip tickets typically cost 40,000 miles. You fly out of Raleigh with Hawaiian.

The good news: HA awards drop to 35k round-trip for HA Visa cardholders
The bad news: HA doesn't fly to RDU or CLT

Still, this option would not be a bad option if you can use those SW miles to get you to a HA gateway (JFK, LAS, etc)

Hey joannelj,

Don't forget to do fare searches for GSO as well. Chances are it won't be lower than CLT or RDU, but it's worth doing a search. As dll states, go ahead and give ITA Matrix software a try: http://matrix.itasoftware.com/

The good news: HA awards drop to 35k round-trip for HA Visa cardholders
The bad news: HA doesn't fly to RDU or CLT

Still, this option would not be a bad option if you can use those SW miles to get you to a HA gateway (JFK, LAS, etc)

HA and B6 (Jetblue) have an interline agreement, and Jetblue flies out of both RDU and CLT. So the award should allow you to do Jetblue to JFK or LAX, then Hawaiian to the islands.

HA and B6 (Jetblue) have an interline agreement, and Jetblue flies out of both RDU and CLT. So the award should allow you to do Jetblue to JFK or LAX, then Hawaiian to the islands.

That would be true if HA functioned like any of the legacy carriers. The way HA works, you can't combine a partner on the same award.

Since I recently got 2 Southwest cards through Chase, I am not sure if they will give me another one anytime soon.

I am also not a big spender.

Given your desire to avoid Chase cards and keep spend requirements low for the bonus, you might want to look at getting a US Air MC. 40k bonus after first purchase will get you the RT to Hawaii. You may have trouble getting seats to Hawaii on US metal but will likely have success getting a UA flight as they have pretty good award availability to Hawaii.

i might be wrong..but why wouldn't you get yourself a couple of the US airways cards....A...they fly here..B...no min spending...C...isn't their one of their hubs Charlotte or something?

I agree with a previous poster that the British Airways card would be a good choice. 25k /person from west coast to HI, and the Southwest companion pass should get you to the west coast for pretty cheap. That's pretty similar to what I'm planning for next April... I already applied for the BA card, received the miles, and booked LAX-OGG & LIH-LAX flights. Now, I'm hoping to find relatively cheap flights from here to LAX.

I agree with a previous poster that the British Airways card would be a good choice. 25k /person from west coast to HI, and the Southwest companion pass should get you to the west coast for pretty cheap. That's pretty similar to what I'm planning for next April... I already applied for the BA card, received the miles, and booked LAX-OGG & LIH-LAX flights. Now, I'm hoping to find relatively cheap flights from here to LAX.

Good point, however finding saver availability on US Air alone may be tough. If the op goes that route, he/she may need to look up partner award on United instead.

That would be true if HA functioned like any of the legacy carriers. The way HA works, you can't combine a partner on the same award.

Huh...according to this article, they have a code share agreement that covers those cities. Not that anything ever has to make sense.

http://airlineroute.net/2012/05/31/hab6-codeshare/

Everyone has given me so many different angles to look into and think about! Thank you! I'm going to start exploring some of these options and figure out which one(s) seems to work best for my situation.

There are (at the moment) only 2 people going.

Also, thanks for the ita link - I hadn't seen that one before.

:)
JoAnne

Not sure why no one except Zamboni Driver has suggested AA. AA flies out of RDU to HNL, with a stop or two. It's 45K miles round trip MileSAAver in coach or 75K in first. You both can sign up for the Citi 2-browser trick to get 100,000 miles each, which is plenty to get you there, and you can get inter-island tickets on AA/HA for 5K miles one way.