Flying from the mainland to Hawaii you require a large margin due to wind uncertainty. Between Kauai and Oahu, not so much...

Edit: This story is about someone flying from Hawaii to California where the flight ended up taking 4 hours longer than expected due to unexpected headwind. Luckily for him, he was in an airplane with extremely long range and had planned to fly directly to Oshkosh, WI! http://www.ez.org/t/cp34-p3

That's a wonderful story. I'm not sure what I like most, the electronics troubleshooting, the perils of pre-GPS navigation over the ocean, or the cavilier-but-thoughtful approach to solving all sorts of problems encountered along the way. Thanks for posting it.

When you get your private pilots license, the rule is "always keep flying". No matter what problem you have, as long as you have altitude and speed first, you've got time to solve whatever the problem is.