Private Pearl Harbor and Honolulu City Tour

Aloha, Thank you for your feedback. We are deeply disappointed that you were disappointed in this tour! In this situation, we did have to make last minute adjustments and for several sites in Honolulu, like the USS Missouri, reservations are required in advance. Your tour guide, Ama, is a Native Hawaiian. The Native Hawaiian culture values place and personal history, and he was sharing his place-based experience in an authentic way. This is island-style. It’s not clear how much of your tour time he spent giving you a slice-of-life in Hawai`i, but you did get to all the sites on your itinerary. In the description of the tour, which you presumably read when you booked the tour, the Iolani Palace Museum (the entire Palace interior is the museum) is not included. The USS Arizona Memorial was shut down by the US Navy and National Park Rangers for that period. I believe we called you the day before (as we did with all the other reservations for that period of time) to let you know of the closure and offered to either refund your money or visit the Bowfin Submarine Museum and Park instead.Usually, the USS Missouri requires reservations in advance. It is likely that Ama didn’t check to see if tickets were available and apparently you didn’t bring it up on the tour. Not everyone wants to visit the USS Missouri. It is the longest attraction and requires a bus trip from the Visitor Center to Ford Island. We regret that you were disappointed. We never engage a tour expecting that our guests will be disappointed, and in this instance, you had several expectations that we either could not meet or did not offer in the first place. Visitors are always able to tour on their own. The reason to engage a local tour guide is to save you the hassle of getting tickets in advance, knowing what is open and what isn’t, dealing with parking, and allowing everyone to relax and enjoy because no one has to drive or navigate. Our tour guides also provide pertinent information that extends beyond their local stories and personal history.