We had a wonderful cruise on the Pride of America Feb. 13-20. This was our 5th trip to Hawaii for me and 4th for my husband. We are 45 years old and this was our 26th cruise ( 3rd Hawaii cruise).We were supposed to leave on Friday Feb. 12 but the news was forecasting snow for that day, so we left a day early and we are sure glad we did. There was also availability for first class on the flight. That was the best use of skymiles we have ever spent. First class was amazing on the fairly new delta we flew on. It ended up being an eleven and a half hour flight due to headwinds. We stayed at the Hilton Hawaiian Village for 2 nights before starting our cruise. We could have stayed there the whole two days and never left the resort because there was everything you needed (beach, shopping, etc.) but my husband had never visited Pearl Harbor so we went there around 8:00am on Friday morning and was through around 10:00am. Then went to the Dole Plantation and had a Dole Whip (pineapple frozen yogurt). It was wonderful. This was our anniversary so we went to Hy's Steakhouse. It was great! We had rented a car through Hertz and that is how we got around to all of these places. On Saturday, we ate breakfast at Eggs n Things (the best macadamia pancakes w/coconut syrup). We turned our car in around 12:30pm and got to the ship at 1:30. Checkin was quick and easy thanks to being a latitudes member. The other lines were long. Sadly, we did not get our welcome aboard champagne because NCL quit doing that last month. We toured the ship and made reservations for dinner at LeBistro since today was my birthday. It was the best meal of the trip. Sunday, in Maui, we rented a car and drove to Lahaina where we ate lunch at Lahaina Fish Company and then boarded the ferry to Lanai since we had never seen that island. We hired Rabacca's Limo service to take us on a tour of the island for $165.00 with tip. It was a nice island although not as green and lush as the others. We saw a lot of whales on the trip over and back. We made it to the ship around 6:30pm. We had dinner reservations at Little Italy tonight for Valentine's Day. Many people seem not to like the Italian restaurant on these boards but it has always been a favorite of mine and I still enjoyed it immensely this time as well. My only problem was a loud,loud,loud - did I say loud? group of 8-10 people beside us that had had way too much to drink and was not considerate to the couples around them who were trying to have a nice romantic dinner for Valentine's but our server was excellent and the food was wonderful. Monday, we took a helicopter tour of West Maui/Molokai with Air Maui. It was awesome! Then, we ate at Mama's Fish House for lunch. Also awesome! We cringed when we got the bill ($167.00 w/tip) but it was a once in a lifetime experience and who knows when we will be back. The view is gorgeous and the food is extremely fresh. We turned in the car around 4:00 and got back to the ship in time for the Latitudes Party. Finally some free champagne. We had dinner at Cadillac Diner tonight since we had had such a wonderful lunch. It was good. Tuesday, we rented a car in Hilo. We went to Waipio Valley. When we got there, a pickup truck was pulled over and had 2 wild hogs on the back he had killed in the Valley. My husband was very interested about that. We went to Akaka falls and Rainbow Falls and the Macadamia nut factory. We ate at Merriman's for lunch and it was wonderful. We also stopped by Big Island Candies. We then turned our car in and got back to the ship around 4:30pm. We went to the lei making class which was fun. We ate in the Liberty Restaurant this night for the one inch chewy piece of lobster dinner. We saw the volcano viewing tonight. We seemed pretty close to it too. It was a clear night so it was awesome. Wednesday, we were in Kona and took a taxi to Greenwell Farms coffee plantation. It was $80.00 for the roundtrip taxi which ended up the same as a rental car would have been but we could have gone more places with it. Oh, well! We got him to drop us off at the Kona Brewery where we had a beer sampler and then ate at the Fish Hopper for lunch. Great view of the ship and harbor. Great food as well. We shopped a little and then went back to the ship around 2:00 and took a long much needed nap. We ate at the Skyline tonight . Thursday, we rented a car in Kauai and went to Fern Grotto, the falls and river, Waimea canyon. We ate Bubba's Burgers for lunch and went to Waimea Brewing Company for a beer sample before returning to the ship. We turned our car in today so we would not have to worry about finding parking and our plans were to stay on the ship the next day since only in port until 1:30. We ate at East Meets West (asian and sushi) tonight. It was wonderful. This restaurant was practically empty. Only 2 other tables were filled and they came in after us. We chose to do one sushi and one asian so we could try things on both menus. Friday, we stayed on the ship around the pool until 1:30. We had lunch at Cadillac Diner again. We watched the Napali Coast as we were leaving port. It was beautiful. Then we ate in Lazy J Steakhouse. We had filet and king crab legs(paid extra). They were good. We did go to some shows but were so tired that time of night, we fell asleep through most of them. I did not see any that were worth commenting on. The one comedian we saw was probably one of the least funny of the 26 cruises we have been on and several people around us were saying the same thing but we didn't go on this cruise to see the shows anyway. We went for everything else written above and had a wonderful time. We left the cruise at 8:30 am and got a rental car since our flight was not scheduled until 6:00pm. We drove around and did some last minute shopping, had lunch at SamChoy's Breakfast Lunch and Crab (wonderful) and arrived at the airport around 3:00pm. We was not able to get first class going home so it was a long, tiring flight home. I know this is a long review but I always enjoyed reading the reviews before I left on the trip and wanted as many details as possible so if you have any questions, please feel free to email me at pwsll@yahoo.com.