Alaska Announces San Diego to Kona

The last of the main four islands nonstop from San Diego.

Depart San Diego at 5:55pm and arrive Kona at 10:10pm.
Leave Kona at 9:00am and arrive in San Diego at 4:25pm
Monday, Thur, and Saturday starting Mar 5, 2015.

Ian

About time!

Awesome! I like Alaska, but love Hawaiian, because I feel like I'm in Hawaii before wheels up. Never flown Alaska to Hawaii. (That's an odd sentence.) Do they play Hawaiian music and pipe in the flower smell?

trackside said:

Awesome! I like Alaska, but love Hawaiian, because I feel like I'm in Hawaii before wheels up. Never flown Alaska to Hawaii. (That's an odd sentence.) Do they play Hawaiian music and pipe in the flower smell?

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They do serve mai tais. We started taking them when we found out that the companion coupon you get with the Alaska Air credit card lets you buy a 2nd ticket to Hawaii for $99. Delta stopped doing the companion coupon with their credit card, and even when they had one, you could only use it for mainland flights.

trackside said:

Awesome! I like Alaska, but love Hawaiian, because I feel like I'm in Hawaii before wheels up. Never flown Alaska to Hawaii. (That's an odd sentence.) Do they play Hawaiian music and pipe in the flower smell?

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I hear ya and I felt exactly the same way until they took away my direct flights! I discovered that I wasn't as loyal as I thought. I like Alaska just fine when I am going directly from San Diego to Maui without stopping in Honolulu.

I, too, am an Alaskan fan, as they fly direct from Seattle to all the islands. Even better, from Bellingham direct to OGG! Great for us Canadians that live close to the border.

Maui-bound in 2 weeks!

pacman

Finally! I was thinking I'd probably never go back there just because of the cost and time of changing planes. Now, I do one straight shot.

Just got back. We do the lax non stop on United. Nice to have more choices.

I just booked a trip on Alaska - - San Diego to Kahului non-stop and then Kona to San Diego non-stop.

Originally I was going to fly both into and out of Maui but I was having trouble finding a non-stop flight that I could upgrade to first class with miles. I learned a lesson that (it appears) Saturday flights on Alaska are less likely to be degradable than, say, Wednesday or Friday flights. So I moved the arrival date up one day and got an upgradeable flight to Maui. But we were still having problems getting upgraded on the return flight.

On the return trip I decided to fly directly out of Kona (to San Diego) and was pleased that the flight was upgradable. I noticed that there were LOTS of available seats on this flight. I'm hoping that they have enough people flying that they don't cancel this flight.

"All in", I think that I have invested around $1100 and some miles to get two round-trip non-stop first-class air tickets. (If I would have flown in and out on a Wednesday, I probably could have saved $300-400.)

I'm thinking that if people are really interested in getting a mileage upgrade and are otherwise having trouble doing so, that flying from San Diego into Kona might not be all that dumb of an idea - - it only costs about $100 one-way to go to the other islands.

Like Artringwald and others, I booked using the $99 Companion fare and then upgraded to first class at a rate of 15K miles per person per leg. Not all that bad. (Thanks Art for your advice on this subject in the past).

We have also migrated from Hawaiian Airlines to Alaska Airlines:

-I did not like Hawaiians heavy-handed switch from Visa to Mastercard last year.

-Alaska has a direct flight from San Jose to Kauai - it cuts our travel time in half.

We flew Hawaiian for years and loved the ambiance, but the two items above changed our minds.

I read online a few days ago that Alaska Ailine is a prime target to be bought
Out this year by one of the larger airlines. Don't know how true or what would
Change but they were listed as one of five brands that wouldn't make it through
The year.

slip said:

I read online a few days ago that Alaska Ailine is a prime target to be bought
Out this year by one of the larger airlines. Don't know how true or what would
Change but they were listed as one of five brands that wouldn't make it through
The year.

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I would be amazed if that happened this year, and disappointed if it happened ever. Apparently Delta is planning to encroach even more on Alaska's routes, but that would take awhile to cause a major event like that. Certainly not this year.

I just emailed my brother-in-law in Juneau to see what word is in the capital. We fly Alaska to visit my sister's family in Juneau every summer, and Alaska is the airline we fly to Hawaii every year as well. I have flown Delta, when we had to use Delta to fly to Florida using Alaska miles, and I would never choose Delta over Alaska, if I had the choice! It sounds like unconfirmed speculation or Delta rumor to me.

Here's the article. Who knows if it will really happen. It's number 5 on the list.

http://http://247wallst.com/special-report/2014/07/08/10-brands-that-will-disappear-in-2015/3/

That link should be

http://247wallst.com/special-report/2014/07/08/10-brands-that-will-disappear-in-2015/3/

The post above has an extra http://

slip said:

Here's the article. Who knows if it will really happen. It's number 5 on the list.

http://http://247wallst.com/special-report/2014/07/08/10-brands-that-will-disappear-in-2015/3/

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The title, "10 Brands That Will Disappear in 2015" is not really accurate. They may "predict", but it is quite unlikely they know for a fact!

emuyshondt said:

That link should be

http://247wallst.com/special-report/2014/07/08/10-brands-that-will-disappear-in-2015/3/

The post above has an extra http://

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Thanks! The article is sort of what I expected-just speculation.

I didn't say it was a done deal. From what the article says they are a prime
Target and it sounds like they have been for years.

artringwald said:

Delta stopped doing the companion coupon with their credit card, and even when they had one, you could only use it for mainland flights.

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Does Delta no longer give you a companion ticket anymore?? when does/did that go into effect?

ronandjoan said:

Does Delta no longer give you a companion ticket anymore?? when does/did that go into effect?

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The Delta Amex Gold Card no longer has the $99 companion certificate. The Delta Amex Platinum Card still has a free companion certificate but a $195 annual fee. Note the companion certificate is only valid in the contiguous 48 U.S.