Where to Stay: Waikiki

Having never been to Hawaii we had no idea on where to stay. We don't plan on hiring a car so close to public transport is very important. We also wanted to be close to the nightlife so we wouldn't need a taxi to go out. We weren't terrible fussed on being close to the beach or a hotel with a nice pool area. We knew we needed two hotel rooms and one had to have 2 beds. We started looking around at prices and deals and got completely confused!

I started looking at hotels then considered renting a condo, but after some interesting reviews I went back to hotels. The condo option would have us all in the one place sharing 1 bathroom which is a recipe for disaster!

Luckily an old friend from school had just returned from a week long trip to Honolulu and I was able to pick her brain! I got some great advice and finally settled on the Aqua Waikiki Wave. There's two queen beds in each room and a nice balcony. With the great exchange rate ( at the time) I splurged and booked us a partial oceanview room.

Some of the reviews said it was a bit noisy at night as there is a night club underneath. In March I had a weekend away with my friend in Sydney. We stayed in a nice hotel above a pub in the heart of Sydney. Yes it was noisy even though we were on the 12th floor but so worth it for the convenience of not having to rent a car, plus it meant we didn't sleep late and could get an early start!

We have booked the Aqua Waikiki Wave for both portions of the land holiday. Initially I wanted to book somewhere else but we couldn't decide where and we figured that we'd probably know our way around after 10 nights there and it would just be easier.

After booking I got onto Google Maps and had a look at the area. Nice and close to Mc Donalds (yes we are super keen on trying American McDonalds), the Apple store (massive geeks), the International Marketplace, a thousand ABC shops and the bus.

As I said before we are not fussed on a pool as we have one in our backyard and it hardly ever gets used or the beach ( sand-yuck!) but we would like to have a look at it and possibly get into the water. So long as no one looks at our pale skin in our swimwear!