TR June 17th -24th in Paradise (Completed)

[DisneyMountainWoman]

Hello Everyone, I just came back from Aulani and of course I already miss it... but at least I can relive some of the magic here with the trip report.


A little about us:
I am the mom in the green dress, the planner and disney obsessed person. The cute boy infront of me is my 6 year old son. Then my husband is right next to me. Then my parents. We live in Colorado. We bought into DVC during covid and our home resorts are here and AKL. This is our 2nd time to Aulani and looved it even more if that is possible. The main difference is they added back more things since last year after covid which we love.


Basic Booking Info:
June 17th -24th
2 Bed Room Poolside

I will slowly be updating this with our adventures at Aulani and the surrounding area. Let me know that u think along the way and any comments or questions!

 

[DisneyMountainWoman]

Table of Contents:

Day 1:
Travel
Arrive at Aulani
Dinner and Pool

Day 2:
Woke Up Too Early
Breakfast
Beach
Snorkling
Lunch
Spa
Minas Fish House
Minas fish house part 2
Minas part 3
Animation class

Day 3:
Morning walk
Painting
Slide
Stamping
Evening

Day 4:
Ocean Fitness
Pedicures
Four season spa
Becoming a Sea Creature
Scavenger Hunt
Monkey Pod part 1
Monkey Pod Part 2

Day 5:
Seal!
Leonardo's
More views
Dukes
Dukes 2
Photos
Photos 2

Day 6:
Workout on the beach
Fish feeding
Goofy surf school
Chillen
Ukulele lesson
More drinks
Random pics

Day 7:
Beach Yoga
Food trucks
Husband dances
Music lessons
Samoa
Fire
Fishing
Luau
Sunset beach

Day 8:
Saying Goodbye
Off the Hook
Lounge
Leaving

 

[Hubie]

Joining in. We'll be there in November after our cruise to and stay in Sydney.

 

[DisneyMountainWoman]

Joining in. We'll be there in November after our cruise to and stay in Sydney.

Ohh nice I always wanted to do one of the cruises!!

 

[EllieBride]

Joining in. Look forward to reading your updates.

 

[DisneyMountainWoman]

Joining in. Look forward to reading your updates.

Yeah great!!

 

[DisneyMountainWoman]

Day 1: Travel Day

We fly United since my parents have the United card and they are both platinum. They bought first class tickets and use their points to get us economy and then they get free upgrades so we get upgraded to economy plus. There is only one flight that leaves Denver on United each day that is direct to Oahu so that is our flight it flys out around noon.

We live next to the airport so it is easy to get the airport. We check all our luggage through my parents since they get 6 free luggage, yeah!!

The regular security line in Denver was huge! Lots of summer travel. Luckily everyone has tsa pre check or global entry. A nice fast shorter line. Then we head to United Club level. Dad gets club passes with his credit card and then already bought passes for the rest of the group. United club level is nice. They had breakfast still out.




I got some pancakes and bacon!! My son got lots fruit.
Then went to the bar for mimosas!

Cheers to the start of our vacation trip.
We chill here for a bit. We see the switch over to lunch. Lunch not good... glad we got breakfast.

We head down get some soda and food for the 6 hour plus plane ride and load in.


They had screens with some great movies. We finally got to watch the new John Wick movie and I got to watch the Emmit Till movie. So did not sleep with the good movie selections My son did well with his tablet and video games. He loves his lego jurrasic world game.

This flight was not as bad as I remembered it and they even got us in early! Bonus.

We landed and grabbed the shuttle to luggage. Luggage arrived promptly. Then we went to Alamo to pick up our rental. We did it through Costco got a mini van for the week for 800 including taxes and booster seat. More than last year but not bad. We did the pre-registration so got to go strait to pick up the car. I highly recommend Alamo. We walked passed other rental car places with huge lines waiting to get their car and there was no lines for Alamo. We picked out our mini van and headed out. No issues

Next up arriving at Aulani!!

 

[krybandt]

Day 1: Travel Day

We fly United since my parents have the United card and they are both platinum. They bought first class tickets and use their points to get us economy and then they get free upgrades so we get upgraded to economy plus. There is only one flight that leaves Denver on United each day that is direct to Oahu so that is our flight it flys out around noon.
View attachment 771414
We live next to the airport so it is easy to get the airport. We check all our luggage through my parents since they get 6 free luggage, yeah!!

The regular security line in Denver was huge! Lots of summer travel. Luckily everyone has tsa pre check or global entry. A nice fast shorter line. Then we head to United Club level. Dad gets club passes with his credit card and then already bought passes for the rest of the group. United club level is nice. They had breakfast still out.
View attachment 771415

View attachment 771416
View attachment 771417View attachment 771418View attachment 771419
View attachment 771420I got some pancakes and bacon!! My son got lots fruit.
Then went to the bar for mimosas!
View attachment 771421View attachment 771422
Cheers to the start of our vacation trip.
We chill here for a bit. We see the switch over to lunch. Lunch not good... glad we got breakfast.

We head down get some soda and food for the 6 hour plus plane ride and load in.

View attachment 771423
They had screens with some great movies. We finally got to watch the new John Wick movie and I got to watch the Emmit Till movie. So did not sleep with the good movie selections My son did well with his tablet and video games. He loves his lego jurrasic world game.

This flight was not as bad as I remembered it and they even got us in early! Bonus.

We landed and grabbed the shuttle to luggage. Luggage arrived promptly. Then we went to Alamo to pick up our rental. We did it through Costco got a mini van for the week for 800 including taxes and booster seat. More than last year but not bad. We did the pre-registration so got to go strait to pick up the car. I highly recommend Alamo. We walked passed other rental car places with huge lines waiting to get their car and there was no lines for Alamo. We picked out our mini van and headed out. No issues

Next up arriving at Aulani!!

Hi, really enjoying your report so far! We have a car reserved with Alamo for an upcoming trip and love the idea of pre-registration and skipping any lines. How did you do this and had you already used them before? This will be our first time using them.

 

[dalmatian7]

Subbing as we are going in summer 2024. I have enjoyed your previous trip report on Hawaii

 

[DisneyMountainWoman]

Hi, really enjoying your report so far! We have a car reserved with Alamo for an upcoming trip and love the idea of pre-registration and skipping any lines. How did you do this and had you already used them before? This will be our first time using them.

Go to Alamo website. Go to the check in area on the website and click the skip the counter line option. If u booked through Costco, Costco has two reservation numbers one with Costco and one with Alamo. Make sure you use the Alamo one.

 

[DisneyMountainWoman]

Subbing as we are going in summer 2024. I have enjoyed your previous trip report on Hawaii

Yeah great!!

 

[DisneyMountainWoman]

We arrive at Aulani!!
We pull up for check in. We have bell hop take our luggage. My DH and son stay at the resort while my parents head to the nearby target for groceries. We decided to skip Costco this time because the bulk sizes were just too much for us last time.
I go into the dvc line. I did not check in online, my mom does not like me doing online check in because she wants me to be able to talk to a person just in case there are issues. The lady was very nice. We booked pool view room in hopes of getting a 1st floor room where u can walk in and out of the room strait to then pools from your lanai I mentioned we are willing to wait longer for a 1st floor room. She said the rooms have already been given out and we have 2nd floor but she can see what she can do. So she offered up being in our room for a night then moving to 1st floor the next day. The one major problem we would be homeless from 10 am to 4pm... I was wanting to do it but called my parents and they said no we will just take the 2nd floor room. I wish 1st floor rooms were their own separate categories so I could just book them directly and guarantee them. It is passed 4 and the lady who helped check us in said they are still finishing up cleaning the room and they are behind. So she gave us a 100 credit for having to wait after 4 without me even asking or hinting at it. That was really nice of her. She even gave my son an alauni coloring page and some crayons to pass the time. I also asked if she go connect our magic bands and she gets a cast member who is better at it to do it. I am soo happy magic bands work here.

My DH finds a spot for our son to color and I do a little exploring.

I have to check out the store too. I will soo being coming back for these on sale Olu backpacks!! What a great deal.


Some super cute pride merch out.

Then head back to my family. My son is almost done with his sheet. He loves coloring.


The castmember from the front desk saw we were still there and asked if we wanted more sheets. We said yes. She is soo nice and came back with more coloring sheets and some free hair flower clips. She said if she came by again in and little bit and still saw us she was going to get the manager. Again to emphasize I did not complain at all to her about the wait... she did this all on her own. The disney difference.

We get the text the room was ready and we head off. We are in the Waianae tower so head right. We go to 2nd floor and all the way down. We are at the end next to the stairs.

Here is our room.


Here is the view from the lanai.


Here is the sucky part of the pool view... no view. It is not a bad view though because it is not the parking lot view and it does feel tropical.

Continue on to the next post...

 

[Counting Stars]

Looking forward to reading another of your trip reports! Following

 

[DisneyMountainWoman]

Looking forward to reading another of your trip reports! Following

Yeah thanks!!

 

[DisneyMountainWoman]

My DH calls the bell hop to give them our room number and we ask for blender and Aulani robes.

Next I had down to the lobby. I take the stairs right next to us up one floor to lobby. These stairs are super convenient. Being on the 2nd floor means we are just one floor away from either the pool or the lobby. We came to fall in love with the 2nd floor of the weekend for the convenience. It is almost the perfect level after the first floor.

I stop at the dvc stand to sign up for the member party on Monday and then see what free things they have. I need to complete this word of the day thing and turn in the sheet behind the art work poster in the room.

I wait a little for my parents so I can hand them the room key to get the car in the parking lot.
Then parents come and we do the hand off. My parents remembered to pack resuable bags for the groceries so we were all good to go. Next we head back to the room with groceries and found out our luggage has been delivered and the robes. Look at these fancy robes.

Next we change into our bathing suits and head down the stairs that is right now to our room and it leads us right to the formerly known adult pool!! Nice! The door to go back through it was lock on the outside though so just one way. We get our wrist bands, life jacket and towels for today and tommorow. We are getting hungry so we get the famous poke bowels, our free popcorn (we brought ours from last year), a refillable mug ( they had the cool new stainless steel ones) and a cookie.




My son says he is not hungry and just wants to swim. So we get some lounge chairs on the side of the pool and eat while he has fun in the pool.


It was cool, we had this whole pool to ourselves. What a great way to start the vacation. And yes the poke bowels were delicious
Once done with food we have some family fun time.

My mom joins us.

Then we head on up for the night but look at these views.

 

[DisneyMountainWoman]

Day 2!
Well we wake up way too early! I force my self to stay in bed as long as possible and then bathroom forces me up.
My parents make their normal egg breakfast and I eat one of my bars. Then I get ready for the the run. I also notice the art work on the TV stand. Super cute we get go keep this and in the back their is another thing to turn in.

Now time to run.
I love coming out here when it is so quite.



So here ia a map of the area and I run the path along the lagoon which equal about 2.5 miles out and back.

I may have went picture crazy... first full day.



Continue on to next post.

 

[DisneyMountainWoman]

Man why cannot all my runs be this pretty.

I tried the secret beach for a seal or turtle... no such luck.
Next my mom and me head to ABC store to pick up a few things. Ahh the lobby so pretty.

ABC store is so close and great. Food here is yummy and reasonably priced.

I order breakfast for son, DH and me. I do take out and bring it back to the room.
DH wanted a breakfast sandwich. This was great.

The ulu pancakes these are the best!!!

My son likes plain pancakes.

Some yummy chocolates.


My DH wanted to try some interesting chips...

We got my son a cute bucket kit.

Continuing on to the next post...

 

[Cinderbrella1]

Beautiful pictures!! Thank you for sharing about your trip. I used your last trip report to help plan our upcoming trip.

 

[DisneyMountainWoman]

Beautiful pictures!! Thank you for sharing about your trip. I used your last trip report to help plan our upcoming trip.

Yeah thanks! Glad my last trip report help you plan your trip

 

[maxbuffmelvin]

Hi, really enjoying your report so far! We have a car reserved with Alamo for an upcoming trip and love the idea of pre-registration and skipping any lines. How did you do this and had you already used them before? This will be our first time using them.

I use Alamo often and the confirmation email usually has a link for skipping the counter. It tends to be at major airports such as Honolulu, Orlando, or LAX rather than the local Alamo branch.