Aloha Airlines West Coast Sale

Aloha Airlines is having a sale to -guess where!- Hawaii, from the west coast, good for travel August 20 through August 30.  Are the savings as tiny as the length of the sale? Let's see:

• San Diego to Kahului, advertised as $139 each-way. Searching for August 21 through August 28, the best we saw was $214 there and $299 returning, giving us a grand total of $547 round-trip. On Orbitz, we found a lower fare of $468 round-trip, including taxes, with ATA.

• Oakland to Honolulu, advertised as $159 each-way. Using August 21 through August 29 as our dates of travel, we found $198 outbound and $167 inbound, for a total of $384 round-trip. Again, not exactly what is advertised. By plugging these same dates on Orbitz, we were able to score a much lower fare of $310 round-trip, again with ATA.

• Orange County to Hilo, advertised as $279 each-way. We found $279 outbound for August 24 and $279 inbound for August 30, for a total of $604 round-trip, including all taxes. We found a better fare of $512 round-trip, including taxes, on an American/ATA/Alaska Airlines share by searching the same dates on Orbitz.

• Sacramento to Kahului, advertised as $229 each-way. We found $229 outbound for August 22 and $229 inbound for August 30, which adds up to $492 round-trip, including all taxes. Our follow-up search on Orbitz lists Aloha in first place with a fare of $518 round-trip, including taxes.

• San Diego to Honolulu, advertised as $189 each-way. We found $261 outbound for August 21 and $285 inbound for August 25, for a total of $592 round-trip, with taxes. Orbitz lists a lower fare of $534 round-trip, shared among Hawaiian Airlines and Aloha. Or for $569, fly nonstop on Hawaiian.

Aloha's fares were beaten in almost every example we checked, making for a pretty ho-hum, nuthin-to-write-home-about sale.