Apparently Maui is more popular than O'ahu with New Year revelers.

A Priceline.com analysis of demand for hotel rooms for New Year party spots shows the Wailea/Makena area of Maui ranked 21 among the top 50 New Year's Eve destinations.

Waikiki Beach came in at No. 25, while the other end of Waikiki came in at No. 42. Priceline.com, an online seller of discounted travel, said the top spot was the Las Vegas Strip and that big city destinations like New York and Chicago are popular this year, possibly reflecting people's willingness to drive instead of fly to destinations because of the economy.

"The surprise is the number of exotic and more expensive fly-in destinations that made this year's list, such as Sydney, Paris, Aruba and Hawai'i," said Brian Ek, who creates the top 50 lists. Sydney came in at No. 19, while Cancun was No. 26. Aruba was ranked at 38th; Paris No. 46.

The list is compiled from a sampling of more than 30,000 booking requests made on Priceline.com's site.