Hawaii is paradise. But paradise has a sense of humour. One minute you’re sipping a craft lager, the next you’re in a conga line with people you met five minutes ago, wearing a shirt your mother would disown.

Enter: Tipple Tours Hawaii. A week of breweries, beaches and bar crawls so relentless you’ll need a vacation from your vacation.

This isn’t your average tropical holiday. This is boot camp for craft beer lovers in floral shirts. This is CrossFit but the reps are beers and the burpees are…erm, actual burpees on the beach after too much Spam.

Here’s how to survive.

Step One: The Shirt Test

You’ll arrive in Waikiki full of dignity. Within two hours, you’ll fail the Shirt Test. Hawaii demands loud shirts. Not “oh, this has a pattern” loud. LOUD shirts that double as warning signals. Shirts that could direct air traffic. Shirts that make your mother say, “You look ridiculous.”

At the Welcome Mixer at Arnold’s Bar, the louder your shirt, the faster you make friends. Subtle prints get ignored. Flamingo explosions get free mai tais. And that first round of cocktails? It’s like social cheat codes. Suddenly you’re debating which shirt wins “most offensive to good taste,” laughing with people you only met five minutes ago. Solo or not, by the second drink you’re in the crew.

Step Two: Breweries Are Cardio

Day Two starts with the Brewery Blowout: Waikiki Brewing Company, Aloha Beer Company and Honolulu Beerworks. Small pours. Big pours. Someone shouts, “What even is IBU?” Someone else Googles it. Everyone pretends they already knew. By brewery three, you’re enlightened. You’re hydrated. And you’ve realized that all craft beer names sound like rejected Pokémon. What makes it magic: brewery tables are built for bonding. A tasting flight in front of you, strangers beside you and suddenly you’re swapping life stories between sips. Beer has no patience for awkward silences - it fills them fast.

Step Three: Spam Is Hawaii’s Love Language

Forget poke bowls and acai. Spam is king here. Musubi (Spam sushi). Spam fried rice. Spam omelettes. Spam in places Spam has no business being. At first, you’ll laugh. By your second musubi, you’ll whisper, “I get it now.” By your fourth, you’ll be defending Spam’s honour like it’s family. And Spam works just like booze: it’s bonding food. Nobody leaves a Spam feast as strangers. By the end, you’re a team of Spam evangelists, united forever against anyone who dares mock it.

Step Four: Sunsets = Group Therapy

Evening at Bar 35. The sky melts into orange. Drinks arrive in coconuts so heavy you need both hands. This is where every conversation escalates: one person admits they cried at Moana, another admits they once ate two Spam musubi back-to-back and saw God and and someone insists they’ve just invented a new yoga pose called "Downward Drinking Dog”.

That’s the thing about cocktails — they fast-forward friendship. By the time the sun dips, you’re no longer “tour participants.” You’re a table full of lifelong comrades, forged in giant cocktail umbrellas and bad confessions.

Step Five: The North Shore Will Humble You

Day Three: Road Trip to the North Shore. Here, the waves are massive and the surfers are basically demigods auditioning for shampoo commercials. You’ll take group photos pretending you’re part of the surf culture. You’ll look like tourists in floral shirts. That’s okay.

Lunch in Haleiwa Town includes shave ice portions larger than your skull. Warning: cherry syrup stains last longer than some marriages. At Haleiwa Beach House, you drink craft beer with an ocean view so perfect it makes postcards jealous.

Then it’s on to Haleiwa Distilling for rums and whiskeys strong enough to fuel a jet ski. This is the point where group selfies go wild. By the second tasting, you’re shoulder-to-shoulder in photos. By the third, you’re laughing like you’ve known each other for years. Nothing bonds a crew faster than realizing you all look equally ridiculous with leis (the famous Hawaiian flower garland) and sticky cherry coloured shave-ice lips.

Dinner at Cholo’s = tacos, margaritas and a DIY s’mores firepit. Around the flames, tequila turns strangers into teammates. Suddenly, you’re strategizing marshmallow toasting together like it’s a team sport.

Step Six: Paddleboarding Is A Lie

Day Four: Kailua Beach. The brochure promises turquoise water, soft sand and paddleboarding. What it doesn’t mention: paddleboards are treacherous floating planks of betrayal. You’ll rent one. You’ll wobble like a baby giraffe. You’ll fall in front of children. Those children will laugh. But here’s the magic: humiliation is social glue. You flop, you laugh, someone hands you a beer. Now you’re all in on the joke and nobody cares.

Step Seven: Tiki Bars Warp Time

Evening at La Mariana Sailing Club. This retro tiki bar hasn’t changed since the 1950s, which means: bamboo furniture, fishing nets on the ceiling and mai tais strong enough to bend time. After two rounds, you’ll swear you’re in Magnum P.I. After four, you’ll be planning to open a tiki bar together called “Aloha-Ha-Ha” or "Mai Tai Me Up”.

Shuffleboard then gets deadly serious. A puck is shot into a big toe. Someone else buys them a drink. Grudges don’t survive round three. Alcohol, once again, does its job as a peace treaty in liquid form.

Step Eight: History Hits Harder Than Beer

Day Five: Historic Honolulu. You’ll wander Iolani Palace where Hawaii’s monarchy once reigned. You’ll stand at the King Kamehameha statue trying to look regal but mostly looking like you might need the bathroom.

Then comes the palate cleanser: one last toast at Aloha Beer Company. Nobody stays stiff after a wheat beer or two. History lecture? Over. Beer-fuelled laughter? Back on.

Step Nine: Luaus Are Boss Battles

Evening: Germaine’s Luau. This is not dinner. This is The Final Boss where pork appears in quantities that defy physics, poi (google it if you dare) confuses everyone and fire twirlers make you feel deeply untalented. At some point, you will be dragged on stage. You will hula. You will fail. The crowd will cheer anyway.

Here’s the thing: booze softens every edge. With mai tais in hand, you’re not self-conscious anymore — you’re ridiculous together. And that’s the point. By the end of the night, you’re one big coconut-scented family.

Step Ten: The Goodbye That Lasts Forever (Sort Of)

Day Six: departure. You’ll hug people you met five days ago like you went through war together. You’ll promise to stay in touch. You’ll WhatsApp. The chat will explode with memes and blurry photos for many weeks. Then fade. Then once a year, someone will post “Take me back.” Everyone will like it.

That’s Tipple Tours magic: a couple of beers, a couple of sunsets and suddenly you’ve got a dozen new “best mates.”

Final Pour

The Tipple Tours Hawaii adventure is not subtle. It’s loud shirts, louder laughs and drinks so strong they arrive at your table humming the Jaws theme. It’s breweries before breakfast, Spam as fine dining, paddleboards as enemies and tiki bars as wormholes. It’s a week where sunsets turn a bus full of strangers into a family — all thanks to a steady flow of beer, cocktails and questionable dancing. Most of all, it’s proof that paradise is better with new friendships and a tipple or two.

So pack sunscreen. Pack a shirt so ugly it becomes beautiful. And get ready to drink Hawaii the Tipple way: wildly, messily, hilariously.

Aloha. Cheers. Survive responsibly. Book your next trip here.