Easiest Time of the Year to Use Miles to Hawaii?
 

I have 45K Miles with NWA, between 20K and 30K each with Delta, AA, and UA and I was trying to figure out what is the best time to try to get a flight to Hawaii using about 45K of miles and the airline anyone could recommend. (I could apply for a credit card to bump up milage in other milage programs)

Thanks!

November (except Thanksgiving)

IT depends how far in advance you book
 

Hi,
I actually got 2 coach tickets to HNL from EWR on UAL over Easter vacation. Easter was late that year so we flew home on Easter Sunday. We went out on the Thursday, a week before and stopped over in LAX. ON Friday we took a BUMP and got $400 dollars in vouchers and arrived about hours later. We had booked this trip approx. 330 days out.

Good luck.

I just got two coach tickets on Continental leaving on April 29th from EWR. No problem there.

How many miles do you have to use?
 

I've seen some that are available for 70,000 miles, but were you able to find some for under 45K?

I just booked 4 tickets using UA miles at 35K each for next July. A couple of years ago, I was able to book 3 tickets on AA for travel in August (also at 35K miles each)

Is not the consistant message here to book early and most dates are OK? (Sort of my airline booking Golden Rule). :p

I'd like to rephrase the question to ask what time of year probably has less demand for award seats to HI. (Not everyone has the flexibility to book 330 days out). Thanks for any tips.

We have gone to Hawaii in the summertime without any problems - 35k for coach awards on United, and we did the 50k J awards on AA before they discontinued that award. (The old P100JJ or something to that effect.)

One time we pretty much did it last minute - about 6 weeks in advance, and got our award seats and Marriott 087 hotel award with no trouble. The other times we did it about 4-5 months in advance.

The few times I've even begun to query wintertime awards to Hawaii, I've found everything zeroed out for weeks at a time, with our favorite hotels sold out completely - forget about awards. But then again, I have never looked or booked 11 months out.

We like the summer in Hawaii - hotels are more liberal with upgrades, the popular activities are less crowded, and you can book good restaurants the same day with little trouble. I don't think Hawaii ever has a truly "off-peak" season, but I don't think I'd enjoy their "max-peak" season around the winter/spring holidays.

When I was booking an award to LIH from LAX on UA for this winter, I found that UA's availability was wide open to practically all airports in Hawaii this winter.

Good to hear - love those UA flights directly in/out of LIH. ^ I know folks on premium-cabin awards always look for widebodies to Hawaii, but I personally love skipping the extra connection in HNL whenever possible.

5- month chart
 

While it does not answer the question directly, I found the "Award Availability Calendars (5 month)" on aa.com interesting as I began a similar investigation. What I found most interesting was the pattern regarding days of the week, especially how consistently it held throughout the five-month period.

Find a link to the calendar .pdf files here. Select the calendar from your orginating city, if listed, or the connecting city if not listed, then look for Hawaii destinations.

lowest demand (which should but may not equal greatest availability) is labor day until week before xmas (except week around thanksgiving), and then week after new year until mid-june (except spring break).

I just used some NWA points for travel to Hawaii for May 2007. 25k per ticket. But had to do some searching.

Do you mean 35k?
http://www.nwa.com/worldperks/direct/charts/us49.html