Save On Hawaii

10/16/2026

Happy ALOHA Friday!! One big way to SAVE on Hawaii is knowing where to eat and where NOT to eat!!

Tourists in Waikiki pay $45 for a resort breakfast buffet every single morning. Around the corner, locals are eating the same amount of food for $10. Nobody tells you this on purpose.

After 30 years on Oahu I tracked down 12 spots where local families actually eat. A James Beard winner is on it. Bill Murray has an unofficial table there. You eat at folding tables and the recipe cards haven't changed since 1946.

A fisherman who supplies restaurants told me about a poke spot: "If I'm buying poke, I go there. They know fish." Coming from someone who's been on boats his whole life, that ended the conversation.

Another sits literally next door to where fishing boats sell their morning catch. You cannot get fresher fish unless you're on the boat yourself.

But only ONE costs less than your airport coffee.

If Oahu is on your trip, you're about to pay resort prices for a plate a local would laugh at. Save this list. 👇

10/02/2026

I cut every padded "only on Oahu" list down to the things that truly exist nowhere else in Hawaii, so your trip doesn't waste a single day. Seventeen survived.

Exact prices. The reservation windows that vanish in minutes. Which ones cost nothing at all.

Some you already know. One had electric lights before the White House did. Others are things locals do before work. One is a ride locals swore they'd never take. Now thousands take it every day for three bucks.

Then there's number 17, the one worth flying back for alone. None of it is expensive. Three of the four were already open before Hawaii was even a state. BEFORE STATEHOOD.

Plan Oahu without this list and you'll do the same seven things every visitor does, then fly home. 👇

10/02/2026

Happy ALOHA Friday Ohana - eat local!! Ono Grindz

The morning I pulled into a North Shore food truck lot before lunch, thinking I was early, the best plates were already SOLD OUT. Meanwhile visitors drop $200 on resort dinners that never run out of anything. That tells you everything.

I tracked down 14 food trucks on Oahu that make resort restaurants look embarrassing. Most tourists drive right past them without knowing what they're missing.

One has been so legendary for so long that thousands of people have literally signed its walls. Another won an entire Food Network competition and still charges under $15. A Mexico City-trained chef who started in a shopping center parking lot won best Mexican restaurant in the ENTIRE state.

But the one that got me? Owners who wake before dawn to buy fish at the Honolulu auction. Tucked behind other trucks. Most people walk right past it. What they do with that fish is something no hotel kitchen on this island can touch.

The best meals on Oahu don't come with tablecloths. They come on paper plates with garlic butter on your fingers. Your first dinner on the island is already on your itinerary. 👇

10/02/2026

10/01/2026

Hawaii is one of the most famous places in the world, but if you did not grow up here, it can feel like a totally different country.

Real locals do not just follow the laws written down at the Capitol. They grow up learning an unwritten code that decides how they talk, drive, eat, and survive a 70-degree winter.

The first rule is the one everybody knows. They are slippahs, NOT flip-flops, and they come off at the door. Every house, no exceptions.

Then there is da kine. It is one word for anything you forgot the name of, and somehow everybody still knows exactly what you mean.

Food has its own laws. Spam musubi is a real meal, sold at every 7-Eleven and packed for every beach day. Every plate comes with two scoop rice, because a meal without rice is just a snack. It is shoyu, not soy sauce, and it comes home by the gallon. Poke comes by the pound from the grocery counter, over rice, not in a salad bowl with corn.

Every adult you meet is Aunty or Uncle, related or not. The first question anybody asks is "What school you went?" It means high school, and the answer tells everybody everything.

When it drops under 70 degrees, out come the hoodie, the long pants and the socks with slippahs. Your nice aloha shirt covers the office, the wedding and the funeral.

On the road, somebody lets you in, you throw a shaka. The horn is for emergencies ONLY.

Nobody gives directions with north or south. It is mauka toward the mountains, makai toward the ocean, and turn where the old store used to be.

Half the family moved to Las Vegas, which is why locals call it the 9th island. The Cal is basically the embassy.

And finally, CVS bought Longs Drugs in 2008. The mainland stores switched names. Ours never did. It will always be Longs.

All of these habits, words and proud traditions are what make someone a real part of Hawaii. Which one did we miss? 👇

09/19/2026

Have a beautiful weekend Ohana!

Ten words. If you were raised in Hawaii, somebody taught you every one of these before you could spell them.

Aloha came first. Not the greeting, the way you were expected to treat people, with love and patience even when they did not earn it.

ʻOhana was the rule that family is bigger than the house you live in. Cousins, neighbors, the aunty who is not your aunty. All of them count.

Kōkua meant you help without being asked and without keeping score. Laulima meant the work goes faster when everyone grabs a corner of it. Lōkahi was the reminder that the group stays together, even when it disagrees.

Mālama ʻĀina was the one you learned at the beach and in the yard. Take care of the land, because the land is what feeds you.

Kuleana was your responsibility. Nobody was going to do your part for you. Haʻahaʻa was the reason you did not brag about it afterward. Ahonui was patience, the kind you needed for the long line at the DMV and the long years of raising kids.

And Pono was the word that held all of it. Do what is right. Keep things in balance.

Nobody wrote these on a wall for us. We learned them at the dinner table, in the water, and in the car on the way to somebody's funeral. Save this one for the people who need reminding.

09/18/2026

One of my favorite things after checking into our condo (no matter which island) is to visit a Farmer's Market to stock it for the week!

09/18/2026

07/31/2026

Happy ALOHA Friday Ohana!!

07/30/2026

Pele is still dancing!!! WOW!