Tonight I just figured I'd write about some things I've learned as we've been to Hawaii a number of times now. We do stay at a condo that has a full kitchen and such so this information will not be so helpful if you don't have a fridge or any way to prepare food...
First off, these are some items I've found very useful to have on vacation - in many ways because you don't want to purchase a whole lot of them while you're away and just leave most of them behind: Ziploc bags (both large and small), plastic silverware, paper plates/napkins, Triaminic cough syrup tabs, and laundry soap. We frequently purchase food and have leftovers and it's always hard to save/reheat leftovers in their own packaging. It's easy to save food in a Ziploc and reheat on paper plates. It also seems like someone is always getting a cold on vacation, so having medicine ready is sure nice. We bring the laundry soap so we feel free to wash as much clothing as we want...it's nice to bring fewer clothes and just wash them.
Another thing I've found very helpful these last couple of trips is packing a cold food bag. Randomly during the year I'll make zucchini bread or pumpkin bread and freeze the extra loaves. They make great cold packs since you will get harassed by security if you try to bring ice on the air plane. So, I take one frozen loaf of bread and put it on the bottom of a lunch bag. Then, I put whatever cold items: lunch meat, cheese, veggies, hard boiled eggs (a Weber traveling staple), etc. on top of the bread. This year I even put another loaf on the top. The great thing is that all your food stays cold and then you have some breakfast food for the first couple of days. It's also nice to have a cold bag available for day trips so you can bring lunch with you...putting ice in a Ziploc makes an easy cold pack.
And, lastly, I try to pack as much food as I am willing to lug around. Especially in Hawaii, food is very expensive (although the Walmart there was pretty decent pricewise). Things like granola bars, dried fruit, cookies, spaghetti, coffee, breakfast food, etc. travel pretty well. One warning, though, my peanut butter got confiscated this trip as it was considered a "cream." The lady even pointed out the label that said "creamy"...would she have taken "crunchy" as well?!?!??!
I guess I might as well also mention this although it is probably pretty obvious to everyone, but we carry on empty water bottles. Since you can't have liquids over 3 ounces these days, we just fill our bottles from the drinking fountains after the security checkpoints. It's always good to have something to drink when people get thirsty.
P.S. The vacuum packs worked great although we didn't vacuum seal them on the trip home. Without the extra food, we had sufficient room in our bags.
