Map of Volcano Village

Volcano Village and Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park are two different places about a mile apart, and most of the confusion on this map comes from that. The village is a small rainforest town on Highway 11 where the restaurants and most of the lodging are, and where you will not find a single chain restaurant. The park starts at the gate. This map covers both and marks which side of the gate each stop is on. For the park itself, trails, hours and what to do once you are inside, see our full guide to Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park.

Where Volcano Village is

Volcano Village sits on the southeast slope of Kīlauea, on Highway 11 between Hilo and Kaʻū, about a mile past the turn for the park entrance. It is rainforest at altitude: cooler than anywhere on the coast, wet most days, and often in cloud by mid-afternoon. People arrive in shorts and regret it.

The name catches people out. The post office is “Volcano, HI 96785”, the road signs say Volcano, and the visitor guides say Volcano Village. They are all the same town. Old Volcano Road runs through it parallel to the highway, and almost everything in the village that is not a house sits on that one road.

The park gate is the other landmark. Entry is $30 per vehicle and it is good for seven days, which matters because nobody sees this park in one visit. It is $25 on a motorcycle and $15 on foot or a bike, and a Hawaiʻi Tri-Park Annual Pass is $55. Important: the park takes no cash at all. Bring a card.

Kīlauea erupts on its own schedule and the park closes areas to match, so current activity is the one thing this page will not tell you. Check the USGS Kīlauea status page the morning you go, and ask at the visitor center when you get there. Rangers there know which overlooks are open today.

Drive times from Volcano Village

Measured from the village, off-peak, on the route Google picks as fastest. The two-lane sections of Highway 11 have nowhere to overtake, so one slow truck adds ten minutes and there is nothing to be done about it.

Two of those rows deserve a sentence each.

Chain of Craters Road is a dead end. It runs 23.6 miles from the top of the park down to the sea and stops where a lava flow crossed it. It used to continue to Kalapana and it does not any more, so you drive back up the way you came. That is 43 minutes down and 43 minutes back, a full 90 minutes of driving before you stop anywhere, inside a park most people have given half a day. The Puʻu Loa petroglyph field is on that road, a 1.4 mile round-trip walk to a boardwalk over 23,000 carvings, and it is the one stop that justifies the drive on its own.

Getting to Kona is a coin flip. Saddle Road is 2 hours 4 minutes and 102 miles. Highway 11 south through Kaʻū is 2 hours 10 minutes and 95.4 miles. Six minutes and seven miles apart, and completely different days: the southern route takes you past Punaluʻu and the South Point turn, the Saddle takes you between Mauna Loa and Mauna Kea past the Mauna Kea access road. Pick by what you want to see, not by the clock.

Inside the park, and in the village

Inside the gate. Kīlauea Visitor Center is the first building past the entrance station and the right first stop, because the closure picture changes and the rangers have today’s version. Volcano House sits on the caldera rim a minute further on, the only hotel inside the park and taking guests on that spot since 1846. Its restaurant, The Rim, needs a dinner reservation. Kīlauea Overlook is open 24 hours. The Volcano Art Center Gallery is in Building 42 near the visitor center, open daily 9am to 5pm, and Volcano House also runs the Nāmakanipaio campground and its ten camper cabins a few minutes west along Highway 11.

On Old Volcano Road, in the village. This is where you eat and where most people sleep. Kīlauea Lodge is the village’s only hotel and its kitchen runs seven days, lunch 11am to 3pm and dinner 5pm to 8pm, with a Sunday brunch from 8am with live music from 10:30. Thai Thai, Lava Rock Cafe and the Eagles Lighthouse Cafe are all within a few hundred metres. Lanikai Brewing opened in 2025 in the space ʻOhelo Cafe left and is the only kitchen in the village open until 9pm every night. The Volcano Art Center’s Niaulani campus is at the far end of the road, and it keeps weekday office hours, so it is shut at the weekend when the gallery in the park is open.

Up the hill, west of the village. Volcano Golf Course is on Piʻimauna Drive off Highway 11, often playing in mist, and the Tuk Tuk Thai food truck parks there Wednesday to Sunday. The clubhouse restaurant that used to be there closed years ago, so the truck is the only food up that road. The Volcano Winery is a few minutes further on: the southernmost winery in the United States, tastings daily noon to 5pm, $20 for six pours, walk-ins only.

North on Highway 11, towards Hilo. The Akatsuka Orchid Gardens are eleven minutes up the road, and their hours are the tightest of anything on this map: Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday only, 9am to 1pm. Turning up on a Saturday is the most common wasted drive in the area.

What is on the map

Every pin links to our write-up for that place, and the table carries opening days and prices. The days are what catch people out here, more than the prices, because almost everything in the village closes on a different day. Eagles Lighthouse is shut Sunday and Monday. Thai Thai is shut Wednesday and Thursday. Lava Rock is shut Monday. Cafe Ono opens Thursday to Sunday and only for lunch. On a Monday in Volcano your options are Kīlauea Lodge, Lanikai Brewing and The Rim up at Volcano House.

The farmers market runs twice a week at the Cooper Center on Wright Road, Sunday 6am to 10am and Thursday 3pm to 6pm. Go before 9 on the Sunday. It is the one hour of the week when the whole village is in one place, and the vendors who bring produce sell out first.