What to expect from a VERY large US Resort

Finally… after about ten years of intermittent dreaming, I am in Hawaii, on the Big Island of Hawaii, to be exact. It is the largest and one of the less densely populated islands of the Hawaii archipelago, and had it not been the corporate hospitality of my boyfriend, chances are I would have chosen it anyway. However… little choice did we have in our accommodations. Having only experienced a smidgen US beach life in Miami some years back while at a conference ( at the back-then amazing Greenview Hotel), I thought a mega-resort couldn’t be that bad, especially when its by the beach, right?

So, onto the corporate bus, and off to the Hilton Waikoloa Resort.  My accommodation was free, but a quick booking site search showed the Hilton Waikoloa, where we stayed, would cost from 199 USD a night.

So, What is there to expect?

Firstly, its huge. Three mammoth accommodation buildings linked by a tram and, yet, by canal boat. Reception is comparably tiny, so our first activity after travelling for about 24 hours  was to queue for a good 45 minutes.

Secondly, its pricey. We got a room in the Makai Rooms , which is allegedly upgraded (well, it has its own pool, and went in search of some food. It was only 20:00, but somehow we only made it was far as the pub – where prices somewhat shocked us. Okay… this was corporate bubble US, but… we quickly learned that Hawaii is pricey, very pricey especially where the touristy side is concerned.

The room was large. It was clean, the bed was comfy, it was a bit soulless, but… it had sea views and lots of cackling birds at sunrise and sunset. So far, so good.

However, being this large, it was hugely impersonal. You rarely saw the same people twice. To get to breakfast, you would walk ten minutes or really take that tram.

And breakfast was… well, don’t get me started. A huge choice of all sorts of cooked goods of questionable quality. You know when you see a sign for “orange juice” and its more like coloured sugar water? Don’t even ask about the bread, or the eggs. As expected in the US, very little vegetarian options. The saving grace were the fruit, but after five hotel breakfast I ate nothing but fruit and an occasional avocado bagel the rest of our stay.  The restaurants at the resort are very expensive. We fell in love with the ocean terrace dining at the KPC Restaurant. One night, we ate a salad and a starter and a side and paid about 70 USD, the other night,  I had, gasp, a cocktail, we had a salad (me) and a main (him) and we came up to 110 USD. There are certainly cheaper places to eat, but they are not in a resort or at the oceanfront in Kailua.

Next: Beach access. You are in Hawaii, you need a beach, right? Well… at the Hilton, no beach access. The naughty bit is, they don’t really tell you that! Sure, there is a small lagoon incorporated into the resort, and you can sit on the rocks outside the resorts and watch the crashing wave, but even as a strong swimmer, I would not enter the water there. Rocks, sea urchins, rip tides… If you walk about 15 minutes from the resorts edge south, you come to a lovely beach called Anaehoomalu Beach. Its the beach fronting the Marriott, hotel, but all beaches in Hawaii are public, so anyone can dome, and anyone does, yet it never was crowded.

Turn left from there, and you find a cat colony (yes, of course, crazy cat person will run into one on her first day at the end of the world), walk an uncomfortable 10 minutes across a moonscape desert and you come to two shopping malls, the Kings Mall and the Queens Market Place.

Perhaps the most high-class shops on the island, but largely unexciting. I got hooked on aloha wear at Reyn Spooner (see upcoming post on aloha wear and useful souvenirs), as well as the Queens Market Place there. The supermarket sells not-so-bad sushi and other prepackaged meals at decent prices, it even has a small area where you can sit and eat. Also, it has the most decent prices on those nuts, Hawaiian Tropic sun screen and Burt’s Bees cosmetics that we tourists may like.

Too bad that the drinks coolers at the hotel were set so high (and un-re-settable by us stupid tourists) that one would not dare to place sushi there for more than a couple hours. Oh yes, and the Kings Mall has Tiffany’s where some very nice saleswomen try to sell you some incredible classy diamonds.

Last not least: You kinda need a car to get anywhere except Anaehoomalu, perhaps the Queens Market Place and the two little malls. And cough up the 25 USD or so parking fee – per day. Can you do anything? Yes, you can take the bus but its a logistical operation – I will tell you how I managed to travel to Kailua for the day on a small budget and you could even go to Hilo like that.

So, you might say, what is she moaning about, enjoying a free stay at a top class Hilton? Yes, right, but its not Hilton that made the stay free, its my boyfriends employment at a software company and the fact that they offered family members to come along. So, would we stay at a large beach resort like this, in Hawaii, the US, or anywhere?

You would need to decide whether this is for you, whether you like to stay in a a well-tended bubble, swim in a chlorinated pool, eat hotel food, and take expensive trip to see the countryside around you. Its certainly convenient, but for us it would too expensive, too inauthentic, and well… just a bit too lazy to do again!  So, for the next few nights, we stayed at a small guesthouse in Volcano and a private home in Kailua, booked through Air BnB for less than half the price, and enjoyed the quirks of staying in a private home much more.

If you want to book it, the Hilton website has fairly competitive deals compared to hotel comparison sites. I book my hotels either directly or I use Booking.com for their flexible reservation policies, easy-to-navigate website and good customer service.

Disclosure: I did not pay for hotel accommodation at the Hilton Waikoloa Village as I travelled as my partners “friends and family” who are welcome to stay free of charge by my partners employer. Everything else was paid by myself. 

While you’re there…. you might also be interested in:

• Day Trip to Kailua-Kona  from the Coast
• Aloha Wear or: useful Hawaiian Souvenirs and where to get them
• A leisurely road trip from the Kona Coast to Hilo and Hawaii Volcanoes National Park and back to Kailua-Kona.