Hotel-review site Oyster.com launches Oahu pages; more Hawaii coming soon

Dreaming up a trip to Oahu, I come across special rates of $189 per night at Hilton Hawaiian Village. My conditioned first stop is TripAdvisor, where traveler-written reviews of this hotel include lots of raves and some cautions. Of course, with user-generated reviews, you do some wading and sifting, not always sure whose advice to take and whose to toss. Some of the tips seem relevant to my potential stay, and others don’t. But all in all, I get an interesting lay of the land here, from a range of perspectives.

Then I go to Oyster.com, a relatively new hotel-review website, which Travel blogger Jen Leo covered just after the website’s launch in June. The site, packed with reviews by undercover journalists and about a gazillion photos, launched its reviews on Oahu late Tuesday. In the footsteps of its predecessor destination pages (Aruba, Dominican Republic, Jamaica, Miami, New York, Las Vegas), the lengthy, thoroughly detailed pages — with a well-organized layout for easy perusal — lure me in immediately.

Hilton Hawaiian Village, Hawaii’s largest hotel resort, ranks as one of Oyster’s list of best kid-friendly hotels on Oahu. And at the top of this hotel’s review page, I get a concise pros and cons list.  As the mother of a toddler, I immediately focus on the calm beach and lagoon, as well as the noted animals (parrots … and penguins?). Among the cons, the fact that the hotel is a ways to Waikiki restaurants, and the supposed crowds at the resort, give me pause and get me to keep reading.

Scroll down, and there’s extensive detail on the above areas, and much more. Yes, this is helpful for trip planning, but it should prove a useful read once at your destination as well. For instance, in the Food section on this hotel, you’ll find that details include, along with commentary, some opening times and prices. And if you want a real look at what you might find atop some of the plates, check out the Restaurants and Bars section of the photo gallery.

Perhaps most impressive, the photo gallery of this one Honolulu property boasts a whopping 960 images. Granted, it’s a large resort, but still…. The photos, like the one above of the Hilton Hawaiian Village’s luau atop a conference center, are “undoctored,” according to the site.

Launches are rarely sans kinks, though. When I explored the Oahu part of the site this morning, I got an error screen when trying to access some of the “Oahu Hotels” slide shows. So I clicked elsewhere, and there was plenty else to see.

Oyster now has 49 Oahu hotel reviews in its coffers. The company expects to roll out Maui and Kauai pages Oct. 5, said Jenna Bromberg, a blogger-reporter for Oyster.

.— Susan Derby, Special to the Los Angeles Times

Photo: That’s no beach in the background at Hilton Hawaiian Village’s Starlight Luau, situated on the rooftop of the Hilton’s conference center. Credit: Oyster

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 23, 2009 at 1:28 pm by Susan Derby and is filed under Hawaii, Hawaii's Big Island, Honeymoon, Spa & Romance, Hotels, Islands & Beaches, Kauai, Lanai, Luxury Travel, Maui, Molokai, News, Tips & Advice, Oahu. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a comment, or trackback from your own site.