Aulani Cabana Pricing

[Dugette]

Our trip is in January 2016. Back in July, we called to reserve a cabana (Christmas gift to in-laws traveling w/us). I could swear the price was in the $300 range - I think $325. Now I am looking at Aulani's website and it shows the cabanas are currently $425/day?! (except for the adult only area is $325, but we have a toddler) Does anyone know if there was a recent price hike? If so, are we locked into the rate from when we reserved or the rate when we stay there (payment is not due until we are there). Thanks for any info!

 

[Girimama33]

They definitely changed their family cabana pricing. I assume that you will be charged the higher price since they charge the fee the day of. You may want to call them to make sure.
I notice the Executive Lanai price went up to $325, and the casabellas on the upper/lower Ama Ama decks went up as well.

 

[Loveallthingsmouse]

We just reserved a cabana Saturday for our trip in July. The CM at Aulani stated that there was going to be a price increase, but that we would be "grandfathered" in at the lower rate since we booked prior to the increase.

 

[AZMermaid]

I would call and see about getting the lower price. We paid $325/day less 10% DVC discount in June.

 

[Dugette]

Thanks for the replies! DH called Aulani today and they said they would honor the rate at the time of booking. Whew!

 

[Schmagurty]

Hi Dugette! Your trip must be soon or already occurring! Hope you have a great one! We're only 2 weeks away from our flight!

 

[Dugette]

Hi Dugette! Your trip must be soon or already occurring! Hope you have a great one! We're only 2 weeks away from our flight!

Hi! We leave Friday! Both our trips are SO soon! Hope you have a great one too.

 

[Schmagurty]

Friday? Wow. You must be super excited! I forgot to ask you...or anybody else on this board...what did you do/are you doing with regards to seatbelt/restrains for your daughter? We're reading up on it. For our 7 month old, we're bringing the car seat. But not for our four year old. Looking at the CARE restraint system for her, but not sure if it's necessary or required? The airline info on it is kind of wishy-washy on it.

Also, I noticed that they did some construction on the area where they usually have the starlight hui. I wonder what if there was anything interesting changed about that area?

 

[AZMermaid]

I stopped restraining my kids beyond the normal seatbelt on the plane after 2.5ish and they were always fine. We rented a car, so I brought a high back booster for both kids (3 and 4.75). My 3 year old uses a Britax at home, but I bought her the booster for travel figuring we will use it at home eventually.

 

[Dugette]

Friday? Wow. You must be super excited! I forgot to ask you...or anybody else on this board...what did you do/are you doing with regards to seatbelt/restrains for your daughter? We're reading up on it. For our 7 month old, we're bringing the car seat. But not for our four year old. Looking at the CARE restraint system for her, but not sure if it's necessary or required? The airline info on it is kind of wishy-washy on it.

Yes, the in-laws got there today! One more day of work to go for us!

So, we bought a very inexpensive convertible seat (Evenflo Tribute - was under $40) that we use just for travel. It's lightweight, easy to travel with, and does the job. We've used this on all of our trips, even one that didn't involve a car. I really like having Izzy in a carseat on flights because it's familiar to her - meaning, she is more likely to behave, be calm, nap, etc. Not to mention the safety features. We have flown without the carseat (before she turned two, we didn't buy her a seat, so sometimes we got one and sometimes we didn't) and those flights were much more challenging. She was just energetically bouncing all over the place and it was exhausting. Also, for the record, airplane seatbelts are REALLY easy for kids to open, so keeping her buckled into a seat without her carseat was a challenge (1 flight we ended up with an extra seat for her after they made us gate check the carseat). I have heard good things about the CARES harness, but it just didn't make sense for us, as the carseat hasn't been a problem to bring, plus we can use it in the rental car. So, that's the plan until she outgrows it, at least.

Also, I noticed that they did some construction on the area where they usually have the starlight hui. I wonder what if there was anything interesting changed about that area?

No clue. Guess I'll find out soon.

 

[Moniqu17]

I just wanted to say that we've tried the CAREs harness. It really depends on your child. It was easy to set-up and I thought it was a great idea in case of any turbulence it seems safer, but my son just wouldn't use it. He was very vocal to the point that we didn't want to bother anyone else while he screamed. This was at 2.5 years of age. It was very hard to convince him to use something different than what everyone else was using. Ever since then we haven't tried it again.

 

[Halle]

Our dd brought an airline harness (don't know the brand) and was told by the steward that it wasn't allowed. The airline was Southwest.

 

[Moniqu17]

The only one FAA approved for take off and landing is the CARES harness. Any other type of harness isn't allowed for use. Also, Southwest website does specify that the actual CARES harness is the only one allowed.

 

[Neraj]

The starlit hui lawn was changed out from a grass lawn to an artificial turf lawn. It should help with maintenance, and water drainage. I haven't had the opportunity to go down to the lawn myself to see how it feels though.

 

[AulaniNutz]

Thanks for the replies! DH called Aulani today and they said they would honor the rate at the time of booking. Whew!

So did they honor the price?

And would you say it was worth it? I've never been able to justify spending essentially the equivalent of a nights stay on a cabana....

 

[Dugette]

The starlit hui lawn was changed out from a grass lawn to an artificial turf lawn. It should help with maintenance, and water drainage. I haven't had the opportunity to go down to the lawn myself to see how it feels though.

Maybe I am oblivious, but I didn't notice a difference. Seemed grassy to me.

So did they honor the price?

And would you say it was worth it? I've never been able to justify spending essentially the equivalent of a nights stay on a cabana....

Yes, they honored the price. We pretty much asked everyone we spoke to and all said they would. We paid $340.40 including tax (no DVC discount, as we rented points and are not DVC members ourselves). We got Cabana #5 (our first choice) and it was awesome!

As far as justifying if it's worth it...I hear you. Heck, it's like 1.5 nights of a room at the rate we got. For us, a HUGE factor in renting the cabana (really, the justification to do it) was that we gave it as a multi-party Christmas gift. We did not get other gifts for DH's parents, sister, brother-in-law, and only got minimal things for each-other. This cabana day was everyone's gift. So, that helped to justify it, as we had money budgeted for gifts. We all had a great time. Everyone loved it and talked about how memorable the day would be. It was nice because we had the family together and were able to hang out and visit at a home base all day - with plenty of trips to the pool, beach, etc. It was also a bit of luxury/pampering, having the snacks and attentive service. The safe was really handy too, so we could have our phones, etc nearby and secured when we wandered off. If money was no object, we all would have loved another day of the same. Great experience.

Just to go back to the tangent about carseats on planes, I'll throw in my thoughts after this trip. On the flight there, I briefly regretted using the carseat. My DD was freaking out and saying she wanted to get out and just sit on the big seat (she thought the airplane seat would be more comfortable - it was not - rock hard, I would have preferred to be sitting in a carseat myself ). She was in tears and it took quite a while to console her and convince her to use the seat (she couldn't sit on a regular seat because we had nowhere to store the carseat while in flight). It all worked out okay, though. And it was more worthwhile on the way back - she slept through our short Chicago-MSP flight. I think the difference was that I did not feel there was room to set up her carseat in a reclined position on the way there and the first leg of the return (seat has a bottom part that flips forward or back to control recline - not reclining airline seat). United's rows are SO close together, especially when everyone in front of you reclines to the full extent, so I didn't want her feet squished. But that uprightness made it hard for her to sleep, even when she was tired and wanted to rest. That last flight, the one she slept through, I set up her carseat in the reclined position because she desperately needed sleep and I was hopeful that the person in front of her wouldn't recline on a 1-hour flight (he didn't) - that worked like a charm. She slept comfortably the whole time. So, I guess that's the long way of saying - if you hope your child naps on the plane, set up the carseat with some recline vs. upright.

I should mention that it was also handy to have our own seat to put in the rental vehicle while there. And we were picked up at the airport when we got home, so also handy to have the seat to install in that vehicle.

 

[Schmagurty]

Thanks for the info! We got back from our trip last week. What a great time it was! I am going to try writing one of my own trip reports and see how it goes. Or more accurately see how well my memory can recall it all. I can say that all of us were blown away with how great Aulani was. It's pretty remarkable and ranks up there with one of the best Disney experiences one can have! The air travel actually ended up being so much easier than I anticipated. Some new toys and a couple of tablets were enough to keep the four year old busy and the 7 month old didn't seem to notice any difference at all. We didn't do a car seat for the four year old and it worked out well. The 7-month old had a car seat though which was great for letting him sleep in.

One thing that worked out great for us was they upgraded us from a standard "island view room" to a room facing the pool area. When she said it was on the first floor, at first I was bummed because I was hoping for a nice balcony view. However, the first floor room was great because we basically had our own "cabana" area in the form of our gated balcony. We could leave our towels, drinks, drying clothes all there while we went out to have fun and just walk up and get it. I don't know if it's possible to request a specific room floor, but I'd highly recommend to anybody to get a first floor facing the pool room.

Anyway, I'm rambling and I'll save the rest for a trip report.

But I did want to thank Dugette for your trip report and for your help steering me in the direction of some additional research and info! It really was a big help towards making our experience great!

 

[AZMermaid]

That's an awesome tip! Did you have any issues with noise? Specifically people walking by later at night?

 

[Schmagurty]

Here's a pic of the room view:

That's an awesome tip! Did you have any issues with noise? Specifically people walking by later at night?

No. But only if we kept the sliding door closed. That door had a lot of sound isolation built into it. I remember one morning at 7 AM, I opened it up to let some fresh Hawaiian air in and the sound of that morning Hawaiian song/chant came blaring into the room. It was really loud. I had to close the door right away for fear of waking the baby. With the door closed, couldn't hear it at all. So, with passerby traffic or any other noises, that sliding glass door does a great job at filtering out all of the audio. I'd say 99% of all noise didn't get through.

You can't tell from the pictures, but they do have a stone step path that leads up to the porch section and there is a door with a latch built into the railing that opens and closes. It appeared to have a lock on it, but I never attempted to use it. But you can see that with the foliage and the brick columns on either side, there is a lot of privacy built into it. We would sit out there and nobody passing by would notice we were there.