When people think of "Air Tours" in Hawaii they generally think of helicopters, and rightly so, because the vast majority of sightseeing flights we have here are on helicopters.

That being said however, I think that flights on fixed-wing aircraft are often very under-rated regarding both performance and value.

It is certainly true that helicopters have the capability to "hover", which is not in the arsenal of capabilities available to fixed-wing aircraft. This may be a limiting factor but it may not be as significant a characteristic as you might first imagine.

I have flown on a significant number of fixed-wing air tours as well as helicopters and on both it certainly could be said that you end up getting the "lay of the land". The fixed-wing aircraft generally fly a bit higher than their hovering counterparts but your overall impression on either upon your return is that you've had a great view of the islands below. In fact I have taken quite a number of photos of island features from both types of aircraft and of many it can be said that it is literally impossible to determine the origin of the snapshot taken.

Occasionally I can even suggest that the quality of the tour I have taken was even higher on the fixed wing than on certain helicopter flights. One in particular was on a flight that only took myself and my significant other on a private tour on which we were even allowed to suggest certain areas of the island that we wanted to see in greater detail and were obliged by the pilot.

One other important piece of "fixed-wing" flights versus helicopter flights discussion is that the "fixed-wing" option is often considerably less expensive.

All this being stated however, I think that if I had to make a choice of flying one or the other and money was not an object, I probably would choose the helicopter because there are certain places you simply cannot get into to view on a plane that you can on a helicopter. Viewing the islands from a plane however is not exactly the "weak sister" option to its helicopter cousin and certainly should be considered as a viable option, especially when price may be a concern.