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- [00:02]
Chris Hutchins
Have you ever wondered how to make your travel experiences truly unforgettable no matter where you go? In today's episode, my wife and I are unpacking two wildly different but amazing trips we recently took one to our new favorite country, Iceland, and another to.
- [00:18]
Amy Hutchins
The Big island of Hawaii.
- [00:20]
Chris Hutchins
While we will do a full trip report on both, we also want to share all the tactics we used for planning and booking, some of the lessons we learned, and all the insider tips we picked up along the way so you can level up your future vacations. I'm Chris Hutchins and if you enjoy this episode, please share it with a friend or leave a comment or review. And if you want to keep upgrading your life, money and travel, click Follow or Subscribe.
- [00:45]
Amy Hutchins
Now, let's get into it right after this.
- [00:49]
Chris Hutchins
The latest report from the FTC showed that in 2023 10, $10 billion was lost to consumer fraud and 2.7 billion of that was lost to imposter scams, which had over 850,000 reports last year. So what do you do about it? Well, first off, just learning more about the tactics these scammers use can help you know what to look out for. But a big way I try to keep our family protected is to make sure all our personal info is removed from as many data broker websites as possible so we're less of an enticing target. You'd be shocked at how many sites out there are sharing your address, phone number, birthday, email, and more. Fortunately, you can get these data brokers to remove your info, but unfortunately the process takes hours and hours to do yourself. I know because I tried to contact them and only after spending 10 hours did I give up and start using Delete Me, our sponsor today. And not only do I use Delete Me for our immediate family, but I also paid for a subscription for my parents and in laws as well. Deleteme is an amazing service that will not just find and remove your personal info from hundreds of data broker websites, but they'll continuously scan for new data that shows up and get that removed as well. On average, they find and remove over 2,000 pieces of data for a customer in their first two years. So if you want to get your personal information removed from the web, go to allthehacks.com deleteme and get 20% off a plan for you or your entire family. Again, that's allthehacks.com deleteme.
- [02:23]
Amy Hutchins
All right, we're back on the couch talking about trips. Amy's on the show. It's not quite as Late. There's no wine this time, just water. But I did think it would be really fun to dive into these two trips we took. The last month has been crazy. We did Iceland and Hawaii together. The goal is to really fit in a lot of learnings and takeaways both for those destinations and just travel related things we learned along the way. But obviously you're welcome to use the timestamps to skip ahead if you want to focus on Hawaii or. Or skip over something. So let's start with Iceland before I even talk about how it came to be. What do you feel about Iceland now that you've been?
- [03:00]
Brandon Presser
Iceland was one of the most incredible countries I've ever seen or experienced in my entire life. Definitely top two or three countries on my list.
- [03:09]
Chris Hutchins
Wow.
- [03:10]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah, I totally agree. So just to tee up this Iceland trip, I want to share one piece of feedback from someone that went on the trip. They said, what happens when you team up a professional travel hacker with a renowned nomad journalist and author who knows the destination like his own home? Magic. Absolute magic. We had the best time exploring Iceland with the all the hacks community and the relationships we forged will last a lifetime. I think that really sums up how awesome the trip was and kind of the inspiration for it because one of the things we wanted to do was create a trip that you couldn't do on your own. And that's a theme that we'll come back to. For those who aren't familiar, here's how this thing unfolded because this is not a normal trip that we've taken back about a little more than a year and a half ago. Episode 115, I had Brandon Presser, who is a travel journalist and probably, I think spin doc Iceland over a couple dozen times on the podcast to do an episode about planning a trip to Iceland. And the reason we did that is because you and I had talked about wanting to go to Iceland and I thought, let's try some new formats on the podcast. Let's do effectively a travel guide to Iceland. And in the middle of that episode, I was so excited about a trip to Iceland that we actually at the end said, hey, if you listening are excited about going to Iceland, also go to this website and we might plan a trip. Now. At the time, we had no idea we were going to plan a trip. I was probably committed after that episode to go to Iceland. But we had such a huge number of people that said, yes, we want to go on a trip together, that we decided to give it a whirl. And it seemed A little crazy at the time. I certainly told friends, oh, we're going on a trip to Iceland with 15 people that listen to podcasts that we've never met and like we're going to spend a week together.
- [04:45]
Brandon Presser
But people thought you were crazy.
- [04:47]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah, people thought I was good. They're like, do you have protection? But I feel like we have such an awesome community of people that listen to this podcast, that subscribe to the newsletter that, I don't know, it didn't seem crazy to me. We hadn't talked to them, but you know, we'd emailed with them a little bit beforehand. And I will second everything you said about Iceland, the country. But I also think the experience of hanging out with new people in an amazing environment, I genuinely feel like we made friends that we will have for many, many years to come. And I hope we travel with everyone on that trip again.
- [05:21]
Brandon Presser
I agree.
- [05:23]
Amy Hutchins
So I thought what would be really interesting today was to just share a little bit of our takeaways from the trip. So if anyone's thinking about going to Iceland, here are some follow ups, share some of the tricks we learned on the travel to and from there, and some quick reviews for anyone who's doing this on their own. So let's start with how we actually started the trip was at a hot springs, which I feel like is both how we started and ended this trip. And I love a good cold plunge, I love a good sauna, I love a good hot tub. And the culture of hot springs in Iceland was amazing. And it was such a good way to start the trip. They have everything from healthy, quote unquote, algae filled natural hot springs all the way up to places like the Blue Lagoon and Humsvik, which we started at, which were like really nice, manicured, beautiful hot springs with all the facilities. I don't know. That part of culture in Iceland and a lot of Scandinavian countries is something that I just love.
- [06:19]
Brandon Presser
Yeah, I agree. We started in Homsvik and the thing I really enjoyed about that specific hot springs was that it was very well manicured, but it still felt very natural. And it's unique to start a trip getting semi nude with these individuals that you don't really know so well. And essentially after a two hour soak, you know them quite well. But it's a really good way to relax, especially after getting off a plane and getting into your trip.
- [06:47]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah, it's interesting cause if you only did one, I would say do you want to end your trip at a hot spring and then be so relaxed and get on the plane, or do you want to start it there? But yeah, it was funny because the first thing we did with a bunch of people we don't know is walk into a locker room and change into our swimsuits together. It was kind of like really quick bonding with everyone. So obviously the hot springs are not clothing optional, but the locker rooms definitely are.
- [07:09]
Brandon Presser
The one other thing I will say is a lot of the hot springs are on these fjords. The experience is amazing in that you can go from a really, really hot springs straight into a direct, cold plunge into the fjord. And the Icelandic locals think nothing of it. They walk in as if it's a bath. For the rest of us, I thought it was really cold, but it's really nice to have those natural elements that are really making your body work.
- [07:36]
Amy Hutchins
And it's beautiful. You're not, you know, in the basement of a gym. You're sitting at the base of a fjord with mountains in the distance. So great way to start a trip. We spent the first part of the trip in the west up on the Snaefelsnes peninsula. For anyone who speaks Icelandic, I will probably butcher all the words I say. This is one of your favorite places.
- [07:54]
Brandon Presser
I loved it. It had a really wide variety of landscapes. I think the people in and of themselves were just really welcoming, very friendly. Even at the hotels we stayed at, it felt like we were almost staying in this massive Icelandic mansion of sorts, where everyone kind of knew each other, everyone was family. It just felt very welcoming. And I remember the first property we stayed at. There was a sea behind us, a lava field in front of us, this quintessential Icelandic white church to the side of us. And then in the distance, you could see mountains, a volcano, and a glacier all from the same window. And that was really incredible.
- [08:33]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah, you see all that during the day, and then at night, you're out of the middle of nowhere. And we got really lucky the first and second nights we were there. Walked outside, northern lights in the sky. You actually were so excited. I woke you up and I said, oh, the northern lights are out. Amy runs outside in a bathrobe because she didn't want to miss it. And this is not a warm night in Iceland, but I feel like something magical happened for you. Staring at the northern lights.
- [08:59]
Brandon Presser
It was something I cannot even put into words. It was something that I've wanted to see forever. And actually seeing it so vibrant, it's truly a one of a kind, unique experience. Being able to see it with other individuals for the first time is A pretty cool collective experience.
- [09:19]
Amy Hutchins
One thing that I took away, so I agree, it was amazing. I didn't realize how different what you see with your eyes and what you see with a camera is you would be looking at something and it would be amazing. Then you take a picture of it, and it would look 10 times cooler. And so I just want to level set how unique that is. And the other cool thing is when you're actually trying to find northern lights in their early times, at the earliest night of the night before they're fully vibrant, you would hold your camera in the sky and you'd be like, oh, there they are. To a point where you couldn't even see them yourself. Which actually, funny enough, happened to us in Hawaii, when there was a comet in the sky, you couldn't totally see it. Put your camera in the sky and you could. So northern lights are amazing. The Sniffle Nest Peninsula was amazing. One of my favorite things to do when traveling is eat wild things. And so if you make it out that direction, there is a shark museum where you can learn about and eat fermented shark. So many people had told us, like, it's disgusting. You should never do it. Honestly, I went back for more. I thought it was good.
- [10:18]
Brandon Presser
You are a true Icelandic human being, I would say. It also wasn't that bad. It smells really pungent and aggressive, but the actual flavor is quite smooth and creamy. Almost like a creamy cheese.
- [10:31]
Amy Hutchins
Creamy stinky cheese is kind of how a lot of people describe it.
- [10:34]
Brandon Presser
It wasn't as bad as I expected.
- [10:36]
Amy Hutchins
Your dad loves really pungent cheese, so maybe it's something from your genetics. You have a predisposition towards stinky cheese that made fermented shark taste good. I don't have any excuse for why I liked it, but, yeah, loved the West. The hotel we stayed at, Hotel Budir, was awesome. One of the other things we did up there that was really cool that I think we really tried to do on this trip. And thanks to Brandon and Jan Gieseley, our guide, we were able to was go meet people outside of just a touristic experience. And so one of Brandon's friends had this art gallery, and we were able to go inside. Her art gallery that she had just opened wasn't even open to the public. And we really just got to spend an hour and a half with someone who lives in Iceland, learn about how people in Iceland have multiple different careers and they kind of live life in chapters. And that part of the trip is kind of a theme, but something I really appreciate and want to Infuse to every trip we take. How do you get off the beaten path and go meet someone that lives in the country and learn about the culture? Because unfortunately, while the staff at every place we stayed were awesome, most of the staff at restaurants and hotels are not Icelandic. And so if you really want to understand the culture, you have to find ways to meet locals, which is not as easy in Iceland at least. So after that we went to Reykjavik. And I'm curious how you would describe Reykjavik.
- [11:54]
Brandon Presser
Reykjavik is a very charming city. It's actually smaller than I expected. Having been there. I think if you did a half day walkabout, you might be able to see most of it, at least the highlights.
- [12:08]
Amy Hutchins
Right. I'm sure anyone from Reykjavik that's lived there for a decade is like, what do you mean? There's so much. You could spend half a day in one museum. But I think the walking tour to hit the highlights of seeing the outside of the city, you could basically walk the whole thing in half a day for sure.
- [12:23]
Brandon Presser
Yeah. There's a bunch of little bars, restaurants, bakeries that you can pop into to warm up, grab a quick bite or a drink, which is great. We ended up checking out this cool little punk rock museum.
- [12:36]
Amy Hutchins
I think it was the museum of Icelandic punk rock.
- [12:38]
Brandon Presser
Yes. And it turns out it used to be an old public restroom, so it was very small, very interesting, worth checking out. It takes maybe 10 minutes. But I learned a lot about the music there.
- [12:49]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah, I thought that was cool. For people who like weird things, the largest collection of penises in the world is at the Icelandic Valogical Museum. Interesting place. Much more like what you would see at like the Natural History Museum than what you would see at like some sex museum in some other country. So I would say it was mostly a bunch of animals. So we did that for fun. And it was interesting. I'll leave it at that. I don't even know how to describe it.
- [13:15]
Brandon Presser
It speaks a lot to the Icelandic culture, which is there are very proud people and a bit quirky as well. They really lean into their interests and these different chapters, the different careers that they have and the hobbies they take up. And they're very happy to share that.
- [13:31]
Amy Hutchins
Yes. Yeah. So every time we were walking around Reykjavik we'd see like, oh, here's a random museum about a random thing. Let's go in and check it out. And in many cases it's very easy to run into these people because a lot of these businesses are small and museums are small and shops are small. And so yes, I Think the downtown part of Reykjavik had a lot of basically souvenir shops, but there were some hidden gems that you could sneak out to if you're a fan of Einstock, the beer that we can get in the United States. There was a bar that had way more samples of that. One night we went to Cocktail Baren, which is actually a really cool cocktail bar. Like not Speakeasy in that it's hidden but really kind of creative high end cocktails. They had an entire train car inside the restaurant. And I wish I remembered the name of the drinks we had. One of them said the ingredient was electricity. I don't know what that means, but it was absolutely delicious. But we had a lot of people join us that night. It was like a free afternoon in Reykjavik on the tour. Even though we'd all been hanging out together nonstop, we still were enjoying each other's company so much that we checked out a bar together.
- [14:33]
Brandon Presser
Yeah, that bar was great. I really enjoyed it. And then from there we ended up going to Sumac for dinner, which was phenomenal.
- [14:39]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah, it might be one of the best restaurants I've eaten at in a long time. And the chef has another restaurant called Ox, which is like a fixed price multi course. I think they have exactly 17 seats. Pretty high end, expensive experience. And then also this other restaurant which is like Icelandic food and ingredients merged with Middle Eastern flavors. Highly recommend. We had such a good dinner there, Brandon invited a friend from Iceland. So we got another opportunity to just meet a local over that dinner. And if you're in Reykjavik, I would absolutely not miss that dinner. Also really great cocktails. One other thing in Reykjavik we did that I want to add is we waited in line for this quintessential well known hot dog in Iceland. And you loved it.
- [15:24]
Brandon Presser
It was delicious. And it was different from the state's hot dogs in that they're made of lamb, the flavor profile was a bit different and the toppings were incredible. Do you remember what was on them?
- [15:35]
Amy Hutchins
I want to say it was like crispy onions and mustard and this other sauce. And I love sauces. So I was a huge fan. I actually tried to have one at the airport and I tried to buy hot dogs and you were like, I don't think that they're going to like last 12 hours in your backpack and still be good. They probably don't have the preservatives in our hot dog. So maybe you were correct. But they were good enough that I wanted to bring some home.
- [15:56]
Brandon Presser
Well, and actually interesting learning for those who go to Iceland. And want to bring these hot dogs back. When we talk to the customs person upon reentering the U.S. they said it was acceptable.
- [16:07]
Amy Hutchins
Yes. Yeah, that was the other thing. Someone told us we might not be able to bring these hot dogs back because you can't bring meat in. And they said there would have been no problem. So going back in time, I would have bought some hot dogs, I would have found a way to freeze them so that we could bring them home frozen and have a few in our freezer. You could probably get them somewhere in the US and maybe they're even on Amazon, who knows? But yeah, I would check out a hot dog when you're in Reykjavik. I would just walk around. There's so many awesome things to see. And there are other restaurants. We didn't spend a lot of time there because as much as that was interesting to eat and drink in Reykjavik, those are things we can kind of do back home in California. What we can't do is get out into nature. And so we spent the rest of the trip in the south. And it was amazing.
- [16:51]
Chris Hutchins
This episode is brought to you by Fabric by Gerber Life. As the holidays approach and I start to reflect on the year, it's hard.
- [16:58]
Amy Hutchins
Not to look at my kids and.
- [16:59]
Chris Hutchins
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- [19:34]
Brandon Presser
What did you like the most?
- [19:35]
Amy Hutchins
I think the highlight for me, both from like Just a Nerd about technology and experience, was that we had hired these two super jeeps and if anyone thinks they know what I'm saying, you probably don't. Unless you've been to Iceland. But imagine a truck jacked up to the point that you know you're entering at like chest level with massive tires. But there was a system to be able to inflate and deflate the tires in real time so you could basically be driving and drop the pressure and raise the pressure so you could get through all these interesting places. And pro tip, if you are driving a rental car, there are a lot of places you probably shouldn't go and I would spend the time to make sure you don't get stuck places. Because what we understood about the rules is that Icelandic car rental companies will hold anyone Icelandic who tries to help the car out of a sticky situation liable for any potential damage. So our tour guides were unable to stop because one time they had stopped to try to help someone and then they got stuck with some liability bill related to them and so they couldn't help them. So if you're going to Iceland, hire one of these super Jeeps, take an excursion, go on a tour, and it's amazing. And so we got to go off into this place called Thor's Mirk, which is like Thor, the thunder God kind of situation. And it's like another planet in a weird way. It kind of is like you're in this island in the middle of nowhere. But we hiked through canyons. Parts of it were familiar because they're backdrops for scenes in Game of Thrones. We walked through water to get to a secret waterfall. We climbed a mountain. I'm going to talk about a video that captures a lot of what we saw. And there will be clips of that hike and lots of clips from Thor's mark. We had a barbecue with more Icelandic hot dogs just to bring that back up again. I don't know. The south seemed so amazing.
- [21:25]
Brandon Presser
The canyons were incredibly rugged. It feels very remote, which is, again, another reason you do not want to take a rental car back there, because the terrain is very aggressive. Massive boulders. Do not try to drive them yourselves. There's hikes that you will not likely find anywhere else. So definitely worth the time and energy to go check out Thortsmark.
- [21:50]
Amy Hutchins
One thing I'm surprised, actually we haven't mentioned at all is waterfalls. And maybe it's one of those things where when you're on a trip before you've been to Iceland, you're like, ooh, let's go find that waterfall. And I remember asking one of our guides, I was like, oh, how many waterfalls are we going to see? And they were like, oh, there's too many to count. Like, you're going to see hundreds of waterfalls all over the country. And so I think the scale of some of the waterfalls was unbelievable. And it's interesting because I've been to places like Niagara Falls where the scale is massive, but it almost feels like something that is like a distant museum where you're hiking out on a bridge, but you can't really engage with it. In Iceland, you have these massive waterfalls and you can walk right under them in some cases. You can put your hand out and drink from them in some cases. And I would probably recommend this for anyone going, I did not take this advice to bring some rain pants and a rain jacket. You can get up real close. A few of us did that without the rain pants and the rain jacket and had very wet clothes. But it was amazing. I mean, I can't count the number of waterfalls we saw. If you watch the video of our trip, you'll see how amazing they are. Huge. Shout out to Josh on our trip, who brought a drone so we could actually see beyond the top of a waterfall and see what was happening behind the scenes. It was just amazing.
- [23:06]
Brandon Presser
Yeah. The footage above is so wild to view from the drone, so definitely check it out on the links in the show notes. One other thing related to the waterfalls. There's one mountain and the Icelandic locals say they're trying to dig that mountain down to nothing because it is ugly. And when I asked our local guide, young Giesley, why is it ugly, his response was, there are no waterfalls. It's ugly. We have to get rid of it. And so this explains just how many waterfalls are in this country. Waterfalls everywhere you look.
- [23:43]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah. And I loved the Icelandic honesty and kind of bluntness that that came from both our guide and everyone we interacted with. The culture is really interesting. So we heard so many stories. One of the things about Iceland is that you're going to spend some time driving, and I think a mistake you could make on a trip is to base yourself solely in Reykjavik, because then you're not only going to have to drive everywhere, we had to drive everywhere, but you're going to have to drive everywhere every day. And so really, getting out and staying in different parts of the country, I think gives you a lot more access. It means you don't have to drive three and a half hours to start your day every day. But on those drives, there were so many amazing stories, I don't even know how I could recap them. But it was funny how a recurring theme seemed to be that in almost every Icelandic story, everyone dies. And we were like, we thought this was really just like from the sagas, the Vikings and all these old stories. But even with children's stories, death is not something that it seems like in Icelandic culture, maybe it's scary, but it's not. Not talked about. Right. And so the story of Grilla, who is like a Christmas witch, or maybe just is it Christmas or is it just a witch at any time?
- [24:52]
Brandon Presser
They use it specifically around Christmas, but maybe other times that they want their children to behave.
- [24:57]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah. And the story is, if you don't behave, grill is going to eat you. I just remember hearing our guide talk about how his daughter was like, I don't want her to eat me. I'm scared. And like, it was just crazy that there were multiple stories. There's also a Yule cat. And it's like, oh, if you don't get something soft, like yarn or a sweater. The cat's gonna eat you. It was just like this very interesting juxtaposition to the way we would probably tell stories. But I started thinking about that. I was like, gosh, I feel like I can't tell this story to my daughter. I joked with you. I remember. I was like, oh, we should buy this book. We were trying to bring home a gift. What about one of these Christmas stories? And you were like, no, we're not bringing that home. And then I was like, well, I guess when I was a kid, there was Hansel and Gretel. You know, the witch baked you in the oven. Maybe our kids are getting soft because we're not threatening them with stories of getting eaten and baked alive, but in Iceland, they still are.
- [25:43]
Brandon Presser
This is a very conflicting experience for me because on the one hand, I agree, I think toughen them up a little bit, give them stories, allow them to hear extremes. On the other hand, I like to sleep at night. And if I tell them this story, they won't sleep at night. Therefore, I won't sleep at night. And so I prefer to keep it nice and easy. There's no child eating in this household. And so I think those stories will probably remain in Iceland. But it is very interesting to experience all of the stories and how they weave in some of these mythical creatures throughout all of the storytelling that they do.
- [26:22]
Amy Hutchins
Brandon talked about this back in episode 115, but there's actually, I think, someone in the government whose job is to talk to the elves and the hidden people in the country and to someone listening that thinks that sounds crazy. Go back and listen to that episode. But it's infused in so many aspects of culture and storytelling and hikes. You're on that. I wouldn't do it justice to try to explain it right now, but it was really, really interesting. Few other things. So one thing we didn't get to do, but we stayed at this place called Scalicot in the south, and it was a whole horse manor, and there was lots of horseback riding. And while we didn't do it, a few of the people on the trip got to go on horseback rides before the trip started or after it ended, and they said it was amazing. So that's something that we didn't get to do, but I would kind of encourage people interested to check out. And then we hiked a glacier, like, put on crampons, climbed a glacier, bent down and drank water that was running down the side of it. I feel like Iceland is this place that you can have an otherworldly experience. And to do that not only in a nature environment that you've never experienced before, everything from water to ice to northern lights, but to do it in a culture that's very different, and to do it with a bunch of new people that interestingly shared similar values but were very different. Right. I think the entire group of people coming on this trip with us, it wasn't like a bunch of people that worked in one industry or were one age. I think there were over 30 years gap between the youngest and oldest person on the trip. And everyone got along. The food was amazing. I will say one thing that every Icelander thought was so hysterical was everyone said the food was so good. And Brandon pointed out one time, he's like, no, no, we just picked the good food. Like, Iceland is not known as a major culinary destination, but if you know the right places, you can have an incredible cuisine and have an amazing time. And I think we were lucky to be able to do that in a country that if you just go on your own and just pick at the whim, you might not have the most amazing culinary experience. But it would be really hard not to have an amazing experience in Iceland.
- [28:23]
Brandon Presser
One of the biggest takeaways for me was going on a guided trip with all the hacks. And Brandon was a much better experience than any individual going on their own could do, because it is very difficult to find these hidden waterfalls tucked way behind these canyons, really deep into Iceland, if you are not a local, if you don't know where they are. And so then you end up at these very touristy destinations. And yes, they're still beautiful, but it's really hard to find these hidden gems going on your own.
- [28:59]
Amy Hutchins
Not only that, some of them change every year. So I asked our guide, I was like, this was one of the coolest waterfalls. How many years have you been coming here? He's like, it wasn't accessible for the last three years. Just the fact that there's all of this snow and ice and water, things are changing every year. I also think you could do it on your own a little bit by hiring people, but it would just be so expensive because we had to hire two super jeeps and we had 18 total people. You could go as two people and you could hire a super jeep, but you're going to be paying for that extra cost because it's just you two. And so I think you get a lot of scale when you go with a group. And the feedback from people that weren't group People was just unbelievable. So a couple other travel related logistics that I thought are interesting for Iceland and some that might be applicable outside one. Taxis are so expensive. So if you are thinking you're just going to catch a Lyft or an Uber, you're not. They don't exist. Someone's flight did get canceled and they showed up the next day and the taxi to go two or three hours was almost six or seven hundred dollars. So when you're coming from the airport, take the bus. It literally is how everyone comes to and from the airport unless you rent a car, which are both cheaper than taking a taxi anywhere. As for getting there, there's not that many ways you can hack your trip to Iceland. One of the challenges is that almost every flight is on Iceland Air, which has its own rewards program that I'm guessing almost no one listening to has points and miles that will get them in. The only exception to that is that they are a partner of Alaska Airlines and so you can book Iceland Air flights with Alaska miles availability depends. But I couldn't find a single date that was available anywhere near when we wanted to go, even up till the day or two before. In business class only economy, which we booked using Alaska points. It was about 28,500 points each way. And the planes themselves on Iceland Air I thought were fine. They were new, they're modern, comfortable. Business class was the same as you'd seen in a domestic business class. So you might think, do I really want to splurge for this? And yes, you will get a bigger seat and more room, but you will absolutely not get a lie flat bed like you would splurging for business class on almost every other overseas flight with the exception of United Airlines does have, and I think it might be the only. But things change all the time. Lie flat business class from the US to Iceland. And that actually became available about two, three days before our trip. So because you get free cancellation on Alaska, except for the $12.50 partner booking fee, we canceled our Alaska flight, we booked a United flight and we ended up in business class. It was lie flat business. But I think United picked the oldest plane that they still have in operation in the entire fleet for us to fly to Iceland.
- [31:43]
Brandon Presser
Yes, it felt like there were small aspects of the plane that were starting to fall apart.
- [31:49]
Amy Hutchins
Not necessarily from a safety standpoint, no.
- [31:51]
Brandon Presser
But for example, the pull out table or the light switch overhead, little things that just felt like it needed a bit more maintenance.
- [32:02]
Amy Hutchins
Also, the flight is so short, I think it was about seven Hours. By the time you take off, you could lean your seat back. We skipped trying to eat on that flight, but if you wanted to eat, it would have been maybe five hours before you have to sit back up and land. So I think if you need a nice night's sleep, you're probably not going to get it no matter what you do, which is why I think it was nice to arrive a day before, which is what we did and a lot of other people did. Alternatively, if you want to splurge with points and miles and you want to have a really great trip there, I'm not opposed to booking a longer overnight flight to Europe and backtracking. It certainly won't save you time, but you'll have a full night in the air that you'd actually be able to get to sleep. There are so many options with lie flat business. So if you're looking to splurge and do something a little fancy, that's one direction. The alternative is there's actually a day flight that one of the couples on our trip had to take because their flight was canceled from Boston. Which if you're on the East Coast, I would recommend because you can take off and land in the same day and then sleep in Iceland, and then you don't have to worry about trying to get four hours of sleep on a flight. So that'd be my advice is if you're on the east coast taking that day flight and spend the night in Reykjavik when you land. As for Iceland Air, a couple things that we learned. One, you do get a free stopover. So if you're looking to fly to Europe, you could book your flight to Paris or London or really anywhere on Iceland Air and then just stop in Iceland for free. So that's great. Another thing is that there is this rule for flights to Europe that if your flight gets canceled or delayed, you are entitled to meaningful compensation. And so the couple that had their flight canceled got a reschedule. So they got booked on the Boston flight, but they also got €600 per person as compensation for their flight delay, which covered the flight to Boston to connect to get to Iceland, and then gave them a little bit of extra to make up for the fact that they missed a very little amount of their trip. The only other things I wrote down were we never took cash out once, never went to an atm, never needed local currency, could tap to pay pretty much everywhere for everything. Even sometimes there was like, if you want to make a donation, tap to pay. We went to this one church and it was like if you want to make a donation, tap to pay on your own. It was self serve. Tap to pay. Amazing. Always when you're traveling internationally, assuming you have a credit card that has no foreign transaction fees, which is most of the premium travel cards, always pay in local currency. So when you're tapping to pay, choose Icelandic kroner, choose euros, choose whatever the local currency is. I think we've talked about that a few times, but I don't know. That's my highlights from Iceland. Anything else to add?
- [34:37]
Brandon Presser
Iceland generally is very expensive. Maybe part of it is the exchange rate based on when we went, but everything from a coffee to a hotel room and coming from California, I still felt a bit sticker shock. So that was one interesting learning that I was not really prepared for.
- [34:56]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah, those cocktails I think were like 28 or €30. It's not a cheap country.
- [35:02]
Chris Hutchins
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- [37:16]
Amy Hutchins
To use our URL so they know.
- [37:18]
Chris Hutchins
We sent you allthehacks.com Bilt B I L T to start earning points with your rent payments today. I just want to thank you quick for listening to and supporting the show. Your support is what keeps this show going. To get all of the URLs, codes, deals and discounts from our partners, you can go to allthehacks.com deals so please consider supporting those who support us.
- [37:43]
Brandon Presser
One other thing that I learned on this trip was you and I have never really been group trip people and I think a vast majority of the people who attended this trip with us also are like minded in that they would never take a guided tour. And I think the experience I had like the rest of the travelers was the first day was a bit uncomfortable because we're all used to having plans and control of the trip and so you could tell everyone was a little bit uneasy. But as the trip settled in and people really started enjoying the experience, you could tell by the end people were like this was the most amazing experience because I never had to think about what is our plan today, how do we get there, all of the stuff that we typically do during our travel. And so that was a really interesting learning for me as a non group trip person where I really enjoyed that aspect of it.
- [38:41]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah, I think me, you and probably a lot of people listening are a little type A control freaks when it comes to planning a trip. Because we know how to plan a trip and it turns out, and I'll just share a piece of feedback from someone who went on the trip that when you relinquish control to someone that can do this at a level beyond what you can, which we did with Brandon and Jan Giesley and others, that it works. And they said as someone who never travels on guided tours, I took a chance on this trip and I was blown away. I would enthusiastically sign up for any trip planned by all the hacks. I got a very intimate behind the scenes view of an incredible place and I look forward to where they go next. So we're not ready to talk about where we're going beyond Iceland, but we are ready to talk about going to Iceland again. So next year we're going back to Iceland. And so for everyone that was on the wait list, for everyone that didn't get a chance to go, we are going to do it again. And we're going to take another small group, probably no more than 15 to 16, 17 people, and we're going to do it again. And it's going to be amazing because we just did it and it was amazing. We're actually going to put a page up with a trailer that we put together from all the footage from the trip. So details on the trip, dates for the trip, prices, that trailer, everything else is going to be up at allthehacks.com/iceland. I'd encourage everyone, whether you're 100% committed or thinking about it, at least fill out the form there. Because last year when we actually started taking deposits, we filled the trip up in a matter of days and there are a few people who emailed me and said, hey, I really wanted to go, I missed it. Is there a chance that I could still come? And unfortunately we just didn't have room to add more people to the trip. So I think if you want to go to Iceland and you want to have the kind of experience we just described, I'm excited to bring people along. As of right now, we're going to plan one week and if there's enough people, we might do a second trip the second week. So head on over to all the hacks.com Iceland. There's so much information. Fill out the form. It's going to be amazing. Okay, so I feel like we've traveled a lot in the last month and a half, but I want to talk about Hawaii because it was so relaxing and so nice. Even though we'd been to the Big Island a handful of times, I think every time we go, it's amazing. Do you still feel that way?
- [40:51]
Brandon Presser
I do Hawaii, it's just easy, but you still get a bit of that cultural flavor that doesn't exist if you go to a destination on one of the coasts or down south. So it's great.
- [41:04]
Amy Hutchins
So the way I want to talk about Hawaii is first off, we've been to the Big Island a lot of times. I'll talk about a few of the things we've done while we're there. And honestly, now that we have children, most of our trips to Hawaii are not driving around the island, doing lots of activities. So I'm going to focus on how to get there. The two properties we stayed at, a few of the things we did outside of it, restaurants, that kind of stuff, and any other tips I have. But this is absolutely not meant to replace a comprehensive guide to the Big island or anywhere else, because, frankly, the reason we keep going back to the Big island is a conference that I've been going to for years, and it just sets us up for a little bit of relaxation before and after, but not excursions all around the island. So first I'll talk about flights, because I am constantly surprised at how cheap it is to get to Hawaii, at least from the West Coast. And for anyone who's looking to fly to Hawaii from somewhere else and doesn't see cheap flights, I would encourage you to look from San Francisco, Oakland, la, and see if you can find a cheap flight there that you might have to buy a separate flight to connect to. Because our flights ended up being less than $300 round trip, and they kept dropping over the course of time. So once I booked our flights, they got automatically imported into TripIt. And I just got these email alerts, oh, your flight's down $20. Great. We'll rebook it and get $20 of credit per person. Oh, your flights dropped again. I think that happened two or three times on this trip to the point that our flights probably were close to 220 bucks each way. And so at that price, it wasn't even worth trying to use miles to book the flight because it was just such a good deal. Now, one of our legs was on Southwest, and so we absolutely use Southwest credit that we've been buying at Costco over the years or Sam's Club, because you can get it for somewhere I think around 14, 15% off. So the price I said isn't even what we paid because we paid for it with Southwest gift cards that we bought on sale. So that is my tip for getting to Hawaii. Southwest makes it really easy from the Bay Area. All the flights are out of Oakland. But one nice thing is that if you have an AMEX Platinum card, there's an Escape lounge there which doesn't have the same guest rules as the other Centurion lounges that you have access to from your Platinum card. And so you can bring in multiple people. And the food's pretty good. It's not a huge lounge, but it's always nice to get a free meal either before or, in our case, we landed right around dinner time and we knew that as soon as we got home the kids were going to go to sleep. So one of us went to the lounge with the kids, had dinner. I ran over to get our bags. So we were all ready to go and we were able to just knock out dinner time at the airport quickly for free before we headed home. Anything else to add about flights either to or from Hawaii or any of the air travel?
- [43:47]
Brandon Presser
If we're talking about flights with kids, which was our experience, I think the few things that have worked really well for us are one, pack a lot of snacks. And by a lot, I mean a lot of snacks. Particularly if you find some new snacks that they haven't been exposed to. I think that's always new and exciting for them and will keep them busy for a bit. And then the other thing is buying cheap little toys or coloring books or something that again, they haven't really seen much of before because it feels very new and fresh. If you really want to buy yourself a bit of time on longer flights, wrap all of these things individually because then it takes them time to open them as well. And so that'll buy you a lot of time keeping your kids entertained on a flight, which is what we did.
- [44:37]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah, I mean, we don't do a lot of screen time, but on flights we kind of have no rules and restrictions. And over the past few years, I've been surprised that sometimes even though your kids might love watching shows on a screen, they get bored of it and you need something to do because there's just nothing else to do on a plane. And we have not had kids that sleep well on planes. We've had kids that sleep well in beds. Maybe that's a trade off. So we've needed to keep them really busy. On the note of sleep on planes, one of the interesting things that we've bought over the years or actually was given to us by my parents, was this suitcase thing called the Stoke, a jetpack. And the way it works is it's like a rolling suitcase for kids and it kind of pops up to create a foot rest. And I think we originally got it because we thought, oh, wow, we could pop this up, extend the seat all the way out. It'd be like a great little bed for kids. That's never worked for us. We've never successfully had a child sleep on it. But I proposed bringing it and trying it again this year. It didn't work. However, where it did work is that it's also like a little rolling seat for kids in the airport. And so our youngest doesn't always like to walk for as long as it might take to walk from security all the way to your gate. And so having something you can put a child on and roll them, that doubles as a suitcase that holds a bunch of stuff. It's where we put all these activities and iPads and headphones in is really useful. And even if we don't need it for the footrest feature, I think until both kids are old enough that you don't have to fight the I don't want to walk anymore kind of situation, I actually now think bring it, but not because it'll help sleep, because it'll help move kids around the airport. One other trick, and this is a Southwest specific thing that we failed to do this time, which was funny, because as we failed to do it, I realized I had the exact same thought the year before, which is trips to Hawaii are filled with kids. There are so many families and kids on a flight, and Southwest does family boarding right after the A group. And I forgot that people line up for that family boarding a lot earlier than I thought. And so by the time we got over, they were calling a group, and we said, oh, let's line up for family boarding. The family boarding line was longer than the A group boarding line. There were probably 50, 60 people just in line. And so if your goal on a flight with children on Southwest, which I assume is the same goal for everyone, is to be able to sit next to your children and have your entire family there, it might be worth getting to the gate a little early and lining up for family boarding, especially, at least at the Kona airport, there's a separate section where everyone lines up for family boarding. So that's one thing we absolutely failed to do, and for no good reason. There was not a good place to eat at the airport. There was not a lot to do at the airport. We were just kind of killing time when we could have been getting in line. That said, I don't think anyone in the family boarding group didn't get a seat on the plane, but we might have got one of the last seats on the plane that we could have had together and probably added 10 minutes to getting off the plane. And when you're landing right around bedtime, it feels like every minute counts. So as for Hawaii, I'll talk about rental cars before I talk about the two properties we stayed at, which were the Mana Lani and then we stayed right next to the Fairmont, which is a hotel we've stayed at a lot. But when it comes to transportation around the island, I think I've come to the conference once without you, and I was like, I'm just going to take Ubers or Lyfts. It's not that easy and quick to get them everywhere. So we rented a car this year, and for some reason we'd always rented cars from Hertz. It seemed like it was always the best deal from Hertz. Avis was always the worst deal, and we didn't search that many other places. And I've been hearing in the points and miles world about how everyone loves National. And I think part of the reason everyone loves national is that they have the best rewards program where the fewest number of rentals until you get a free rental. But I thought the price wasn't that much more. It was like 20 bucks more. And one of the nice things is if you have Executive Elite status on national and you book a full size car, you can pick any car on the lot. And so when we got there, I picked a minivan, which because we were traveling with our kids and my parents, we needed a little bit of extra space and the cost to rent that minivan would have been way more. And every time we rent at Hertz, we never get an upgrade, like to a minivan or to an suv. So I'm sold. One hack here is you can always book a non prepaid rate at national and you could also book a backup at Hertz if you want. And if you show up at national and they're like, hey, the only car we have is this, you can say, all right, I'm not interested. You can go get your Hertz rental. I have heard people doing that in the past. We just booked national and we rolled the dice and it was great. I can't validate this on their website, but the person I picked it up from told me we could add up to seven or nine people for free as extra drivers. Looks like you can definitely add your partner, but I didn't see that written on the website, but they seem to have no issue. We added my mom. That was no extra cost, so I don't know. I'm a convert to National. It also happens to be one of the closest rental car counters to the Kona Airport, which, if you don't know, you can walk. They have shuttle buses, but it's a pretty close walk as well.
- [49:50]
Brandon Presser
Yeah. And the one thing that made renting a car really easy and Transporting just to and from both airports is the Ride Saver Vest, a five point harness system that replace a car seat. So they've been safety tested, they've gone through the same kind of safety standards and they're amazing because they collapse down into something very, very small. So as opposed to carrying one or two or however many car seats you need, you now have these little vests that can just pop on them. You put them in, secure them in via seat belts and off you go. They're a game changer.
- [50:29]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah. Or rent car seats, which national does not provide for free. And technically, I think it's funny, the Ride Saver Travel Vest is a car seat. Legally, car seats in America expire. And so it has this thing which is really just made up of different straps and some Velcro. They're like, this thing expires in seven years. I'm like, what about this expires in seven years? I don't know. But the main thing it does is it just reroutes the seat belts so that they're safe for children. And they're so small that I just put them in my backpack along with half of the stuff I was bringing on the trip. So love those, they're great. I'm not going to go any deeper on rental cars and car transit, but there is an episode I did episode 66 on basically everything you could want to know to optimize rental cars and saving money. So if you're renting a car, head back there. Let's talk about the properties we stayed at and some of the activities. First place we stay was the Manilani. I'm curious what you thought.
- [51:16]
Brandon Presser
The model only was really beautiful and comfortable and clean, which is very important for me. I loved it. I would 100% stay there again.
- [51:26]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah. So walking into that hotel is amazing because there's this massive atrium that I don't even know how to describe, but it was a really, really amazing experience at that hotel. Walking in, I thought it was so family friendly. Giving the kids their lays, giving them a juice. Like just the entire experience through and through was this is definitely a family friendly hotel. However, it wasn't over the top family friendly. There weren't water slides everywhere, There weren't kids activities everywhere. So they did have a kids club. Our kids aren't old enough for it, so we didn't get to do that. There was also an adult pool. So if you want to slip away from children because you're not traveling with them, that's an option. Tons of activities. So I Think anyone that's been to Hawaiian knows this. Almost every hotel with a beach has an activity hut. And you could do stand up paddleboarding, which I recommend. We did that. We did a sunrise canoe, which I think you were a little skeptical of. But for whatever reason, the week we went, all activities were free. And so I was like, well, let's get in all the activities. Do you want to wake up early and do a sunrise canoe paddle? What did you think?
- [52:28]
Brandon Presser
It was amazing. It was nice to hear the stories from generations of Hawaiian people in the way that their villages and communities used to wake up together and collectively prepare for the day. And that's really what it was about them coming out in these boats and welcoming the sun and the wind and the water and all of the things that are important for them. So it was a really nice grounding way to start the day.
- [52:56]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah. And one of the crazy things was we didn't actually know that all of these activities were going to be free when we showed up. And they didn't put it on their website. And so it's certainly something that I would encourage everyone booking a trip to reach out to the hotel because there might be these crazy promotions happening that they don't publicize that could really sway your experience. And so I remember when we were at this beach hut talking about what to do, they said, oh, if you want to do this snorkel, it's a perfect time to do it. Because a snorkel was like a hundred something dollars per person for a boat snorkel tour. But this day was free. And they're like, if you had a family of four, you saved almost $500. And so if that's the kind of activity you want to do and you're comparing two hotels and they're about the same price, it's always worth calling and asking, are there any promotions for any of the activities at the hotel or anything like that? Because whether the kids club is free, whether the activities are free, whether there's like super discounted happy hour drinks, whatever it is you want to do on your trip, there might be some of those things that you just don't know about because for whatever reason, hotels don't always publicize them on their website. So that's something I'd look up. Also, like activities, sometimes they have yoga and at some hotels you have to pay for it. In some hotels it's free. Fitness classes. All those sorts of things are worth looking into. Before you go. A couple other interesting notes that I wrote down on this hotel because I got to take a little bit of a tour myself and one of the staff showed me a few cool things. The gym, we didn't use it once, but it's amazing. Like, it actually felt like a real thorough gym with everything from box jumping to everything you would want. We had kids, we didn't have time to go to the gym, but it looked great. Few other things about the hotel. Food was incredible. I think that we've never had a room service dinner in any hotel. And my parents agreed, who've stayed at far more hotels than I have, as good as the room service we had in this hotel, with the only exception. And I gave them this feedback that if you're serving ice cream for dessert, maybe bring it like 20 minutes later because Hawaii is hot. And the ice cream did not last like I imagine they intended. But the actual food delivered was as good as the food we had in the restaurant.
- [55:07]
Brandon Presser
Yeah, I agree. I think that was actually a good hack for us as well, where when we arrived, by the time that we got into our room and settled in, it was time for dinner and Hawaii is three hours behind us. And so we're all feeling pretty tired by the end of the day. And ordering room service was such a great hack to wind down in a really easy, low energy way to then transition into bedtime with no difficulty. And yes, the room service there specifically was probably just as good as eating it at the restaurant.
- [55:44]
Amy Hutchins
One thing that I think some places do is they have a kids menu, but they just charge pretty unreasonable amounts. This kids menu was pretty reasonable and the portions were so big that there was one night where I was like, I think I kind of just want to order off the kids menu. And that seemed unreasonable at a restaurant, but I was like, but if we do room service, they don't know if this food's for me or the kids. And the portions were great. So there's a little hack for you that we didn't end up doing room service twice, but if we did, I absolutely would have ordered off the kids menu and saved a few bucks. This hotel, as well as the Fairmont, I think are both hotels that come with perks if you book them through the right channel. So whether that's using fine hotels and resorts from Amex, if you have a platinum card, you can get your $200 credit. Or the site we set up hotels that all the hacks.com and the password on that site is now perks. Where a lot of these luxury hotels have a deal, where if you book them through the Right. Channel. You usually get a property credit of 100 or $200. An upgrade on availability, late checkout, early check in, and usually free breakfast. The breakfast here was awesome. I am a sucker for a resort breakfast where I can just try 100 different things on my plate. All you can eat, Try to do it a little late. So it's your breakfast and your lunch. I really don't think there's a better meal to be had than a high end, delicious breakfast buffet at a resort.
- [57:01]
Brandon Presser
The breakfast buffet was amazing. Definitely great going on the later side. Save that money. And one of the other restaurants that I actually really enjoyed was Canoe House. So it's also at the Monolani. It's definitely on the pricier side, but the food is phenomenal.
- [57:17]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah. It's like their fine dining restaurant right on the water. A huge grassy area. So if you do take your kids, plenty of place for them to run around. The one time we ate there, we did not have children, but man, the food was so good. I remember this, like, Japanese milk bread, shokupan. That was awesome.
- [57:34]
Brandon Presser
It is just consistently very good. Every dish we ordered was amazing. And actually their portions are quite large. So just beware. You'll want to order everything on the menu. We unfortunately did the night we went and we had so many leftovers.
- [57:49]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah. Fortunately, all the rooms had little mini fridges, which is nice to be able to store some extra food if the kids need to eat a little snack later. Two other little things. One, the staff told us that they had a laundry room. And all I could think about was how many hotels that we've stayed at have a place that you could do a quick load of laundry that I've just never heard about. Maybe this is rare and unique to this hotel. Maybe it's normal. And I didn't know. But they do have a place where if you're traveling for an extended period of time or you just have kids that try on seven outfits and get them all dirty throughout the day, you can do a quick load of laundry. They also, I love this trend, have free sunscreen. And there is nothing that makes me happier than going to a hotel that has free sunscreen. I don't know why. It's probably like the frugal side of me that's like, I'm just going to go use their free sunscreen. There's one time where I think my parents, like, had brought some sunscreen they were using. The room was like, no, no, no, no. Don't use the sunscreen you paid for. We can go get the free sunscreen down to the pool. But I feel like that's very, very much a me comment and you're giving me, giving me some eyes.
- [58:50]
Brandon Presser
It's funny that you say this because the properties that offer this nice free sunscreen are actually more expensive.
- [58:59]
Amy Hutchins
Oh, I'm paying for a way.
- [59:00]
Brandon Presser
You're paying for it.
- [59:02]
Amy Hutchins
Yes. It's not just.
- [59:02]
Brandon Presser
Not directly exactly, but I'm glad you feel so happy walking away with that free sunscreen from the beach.
- [59:08]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah, I mentioned we talk about the Fairmont briefly because it's next door. We've stayed there a few times. We were there for the conference, but we didn't stay on site. And so the only few things I'll add, they have a bigger pool that I think if you're coming with kids that like exploring a massive, massive pool, doesn't have slides and lazy rivers and all those things like you might have at one of the major big resorts. But it has a lot more space to play around. Other than that, it's pretty similar. They also have a restaurant that's like, right, right on the water that's super casual. So honestly, sometimes I'm like, it's nice to just put your feet in the sand, have a casual lunch, look out at the ocean. That was one thing that the monolay was missing. They did have like a surf shack, but they didn't have a little restaurant there. At this point, we're talking about little things on both sides. Both hotels are fantastic. They'll both hold a lot of fond memories. We've had multiple friends get married at the Fairmont. The Mauna Lani is kind of a new addition, but it was really amazing. So I don't know. Both of those are great. Anywhere on the island's probably also awesome. But let's talk a little bit about some of the other things we've done outside of the hotel. No matter where you're staying, the nice.
- [60:15]
Brandon Presser
Thing about the Mauna Lani and the Fairmont is that they're both in these areas where there's these protected cove parts of the ocean that make it really accessible for snorkeling, stand up paddleboarding and some of those activities. And so you can easily just swim out or take a paddleboard or whatever and see fish. We saw several sea turtles. It was just really, really low lift, super easy, and just felt really magical being able to do that. The one other thing we did was contact our concierge and ask them about the night snorkeling session with manta rays. And they gave us A few highly recommended options. And we ended up booking one for our au pair. And she said it was hands down the best experience she's ever had. And she actually was a little nervous going into it, but by the end, she was like, I was the last one out of the water because there were so many things to see. And the Mantles got so close that it just felt like something I didn't want to ever let go of.
- [61:23]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah. I met a couple people at the conference I was going to, and they were like, well, we have one extra night. We're trying to figure out what to do. And I was like, oh, you should go snorkel with manta rays at night. And they did. And they were like, you should come with us. And we were like, no, no, it's our last night. We gotta leave early in the morning. I kind of regret not doing it. They said it was one of the most amazing things they've also done. So if we're back on the Big island, which we likely will, I think we need to find a way to do it.
- [61:46]
Brandon Presser
Agree.
- [61:47]
Amy Hutchins
A couple other spots that we've been to over the years. So Lava Lava Beach Club is this great casual restaurant right on the sand. Food is good. I don't remember the food as much as I remember the drinks, the sand, the sunset, the fact that they always seem to have live music and hula dancers. The kids can run around. I think if you want a break from your hotel or if you want a less expensive meal than your hotel. Lava Lava Beach Club is one of my favorite spots. I feel like every time we're on the Big island, we end up there.
- [62:15]
Brandon Presser
It's such a solid place.
- [62:16]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah. A few other things we've done in the past, we've gone to the Poke Shack, if you want some poke. It was delicious. One other place. Do you remember a couple years ago going to on the Rocks?
- [62:26]
Brandon Presser
I do, yeah.
- [62:28]
Amy Hutchins
Great little cocktails on the beach. We had dinner. Drinks, drinks, drinks. And it was a ton of fun. So I would go back there and I'll just validate it with. I told one of our waitresses at a restaurant that we had been there in the past, and she was like, I love that spot. So it's not just a hazy memory of good times that got validated. And then one activity we've done in the past that we didn't do on this trip was going out on a catamaran. And I kind of wish we did it this time. I always love being out on the water on a boat, but we've done it once at one of the weddings we went on once just on our own. And so I would say if you're on the Big island or really any island in Hawaii, that's something I would add. I think that's all we have on Hawaii. Anything else?
- [63:12]
Brandon Presser
No, but we're testing out this newer format so we'd love any thoughts or feedback on what you like, what you don't like.
- [63:20]
Amy Hutchins
So you all know podcastlthehacks.com, you can send anything in. Would love to know what you think of this. Also, Amy and I are gonna record an AMA episode where we're taking questions both for me, for Amy, for both of us. If you have any, go to allthehacks.com ama we would love to hear them. Answer them and you'll expect that episode in a couple weeks. I hope you enjoyed this format, feedback, questions, anything. Podcastlthehacks.com that's it for this week. I'll see you next week.