2 Weeks

That's all we had to go to Hawaii and find a venue, date, and interview vendors in the midst of family events and plenty of distractions. Paul and I had a mission. We needed to secure a date with a good venue within our budget...kind of hard in Hawaii, the wedding destination capital of the world. I knew coming in that we would have to make compromises here and there, but we soon came to the realization that planning a wedding was harder than I thought.

The first venue we visited was the Luana Hills Country Club. That was an amazing venue. The ceremony site was huge, and we were surrounded by the beauty of the mountains. The only problem was that the reception area was quoted to hold only 180 comfortably. Originally, we had about 250+ estimated on our invitation list. I guess if a few people couldn't make it, that wouldn't be a problem, but that was a LOT of "few people" that we hope don't show up. We couldn't treat our guests that way so we were really disappointed leaving Luana Hills.


Entrance to Luana Hills Country Club

The second venue was Hale Koa. Hale Koa is located in Waikiki and is actually a military resort. In order to get in you have to be in the military or sponsored by the military, and it was one of the most affordable hotels in Waikiki to hold a wedding. The price was just right, except that we had to account for a 5-8% increase for next year which we wouldn't get into writing; so things could easy change. Plus it was a different feel from what we wanted our guests to experience. There was more than enough room to accommodate for our guests, but we would lose the intimacy. We had to think really hard about these details...


View of Hale Koa Reception Area

The third option was the Moana Surfrider also located in Waikiki. Although it was extremely beautiful, it was very crowded. There were strangers (tourists/beachgoers) who could crash the wedding or be in the background ruining pictures. On top of that it was really expensive. It would pretty much wipe our our entire wedding budget; so we would have a ceremony and reception, no flowers, photographer, cake, etc. The Waikiki area is tough on the locals who would have a hard time with parking. I feel that it was still good we visited this option. I appreciated venues located outside of Waikiki more.

View of Surfrider Ballroom

Lastly, we visited the Ko'olau Golf Course. We had high hopes for this venue. How it was described to us was "Luana Hills but bigger" which was exactly what we were looking for. We explored the site, and it was true. The reception area could accommodate our guests and then some, but then we started to see details that would be hard to deal with. The outdoor ceremony site was extremely small and...awkward. I don't know how our wedding party would fit and the entrance to the site was all the way around the building from a side path. There was no real "grand entrance" for the bridal party. The reception area had a really great view, but if you were guests sitting on the upper level (about half of the guests), your view would be obstructed by huge columns. I know that guests would adjust, but it would be a little annoying. It seemed that no place was going to be perfect...

View of outdoor ceremony site