A Chocolate Tour experience by Lavaloha Chocolate Farm. Back to all Big Island tours.
Tour Summary: A 1-hour guided tour of Lavaloha's working cacao farm outside Hilo, covering the full tree-to-bar process from orchard to tasting lounge. From $33.
Groups are kept small, which means the guide can stop and take questions in the orchard rather than keeping to a fixed script. 
The farm tour runs on a small electric bus, keeping the route quiet and accessible for all group sizes. Guides open pods in the orchard so visitors can see the raw beans and taste the fresh pulp before moving to the processing area. Tours stop in the orchard to examine the pods up close. The farm grows three varieties, including the rare Criollo. After fermentation, beans are dried here before roasting: one of several stages covered on the tour. The shop at the end of the tour carries Lavaloha's finished chocolates and other local products, most of which aren't sold in Hilo stores.
5 Tour Highlights:
- Guided electric bus tour through working cacao orchards
- Taste fresh cacao fruit directly from a cracked pod
- Taste various chocolate varieties made at the farm
- Watch the full tree-to-bar production process
- Small groups of around 8–10 people
Tour Information:
| Price: | Adult | Youth |
|---|---|---|
| (excluding taxes & fees) | $33 | $10 |
Price note: A $10 discount is available for Kama'aina Adults and active/vereteran military.
Tour Provider: Lavaloha Chocolate Farm
Activity: Chocolate Tour
Tour start time: 9:15 am, 10:30 am, 2:00 pm, 3:30 pm
Duration: 1 hour
Location: Hilo
Pick-up available? No
Cancellations: Customers may receive a full refund or reschedule their tour at no extra cost if they provide 48 hours' notice before their scheduled tour date and time. No refunds will be issued for cancellations made less than 48 hours before the scheduled tour date and/or time. If you reschedule your tour within 48 hours of the scheduled time to a different date and time, there will be a $30.00 rescheduling fee. No further changes, rescheduling, or refunds will be allowed once the change is made, or if the group is unable to attend the rescheduled tour.
Read more: about chocolate tour in our Big Island chocolate tour guide.
Read more about this tour
The tour starts at Lavaloha’s Visitor Center, where a guide loads the group onto a small electric bus for a loop through the farm’s cacao orchards. The property is about 15 minutes from downtown Hilo — 1,000 acres total, with 24 dedicated to cacao and another 11 to coffee. The guide explains how the volcanic soil and the rainfall affect the flavor of the beans.
The farm tour runs on a small electric bus.
The bus stops in one of the orchards for a closer look at the trees. The guide opens a cacao pod to show the white, pulpy interior surrounding the raw beans. The fresh pulp tastes citrusy and tropical, nothing like chocolate, and it’s good to eat on its own.
Guides open pods in the orchard so visitors can see the raw beans and taste the fresh pulp before moving to the processing area.
After the orchard, the tour moves through the processing areas for the drying, roasting, grinding. The guide explains each step briefly. In the chocolate lounge, you taste several samples of dark, milk, white, and flavored chocolate, and the guide connects each one to what you saw in the orchard.
After fermentation, beans are dried here before roasting.
The tour wraps at the Visitor Center, where the shop carries Lavaloha’s finished chocolate alongside other local products. Expect to pay more than for supermarket chocolate, since it’s single-origin Hawaiian, and most of what’s on the shelf isn’t sold in Hilo stores.
The shop at the end of the tour carries Lavaloha’s finished chocolates and other local products, most of which aren’t sold in Hilo stores.
What other people say:
With 169 reviews averaging five stars over several comparison websites, the guides are the consistent reason people leave satisfied. They explain the science in plain terms, and reviewers say the tastings keep it from feeling like a lecture. Reviewers like the chocolate, but a few mention a pushy sales pitch in the gift shop at the end.
The pace is easy with kids. You ride the electric bus between stops and parts of the route are covered, so strollers and anyone with limited mobility can manage it.
About Lavaloha Chocolate Farm
Lavaloha is one of the few places on the Big Island where you can walk through a working cacao orchard, taste the raw fruit off the tree, and then sit down with finished chocolate made from those same beans. The small group size (around 8–10 people) and knowledgeable guides make this more substantive than a typical farm stop. It’s well-suited to curious travelers, families with kids, and anyone who wants to understand why Hawaiian cacao commands the prices it does. At around $43 per person (discounts available), it’s one of the better-value experiential tours near Hilo.
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