Booking choice: The Lydgate Farms chocolate tour, from $145 per person. Check dates Compare the options below
Lydgate Farms is a 46-acre family farm on Kauai's east side with around 3,000 cacao trees, planted from 2002, alongside vanilla, fruit trees and bees. Its beans have been recognised several times by the Cocoa of Excellence awards in Paris.
The tour is a guided walk and a long sit-down tasting, not a factory visit. That is its strength: you see how chocolate starts, taste the fresh fruit, and end with chocolate made from beans grown on the farm.
The quick answer
The tour lasts about three hours: roughly the first half in the gardens with honey, vanilla and fruit, then the cacao orchard, then a long guided chocolate tasting. It runs Monday to Friday from 5730 Olohena Road in Kapaa, takes ages 9 and over, and has no pickup. It is not at Lydgate Beach Park.
Where does the Lydgate Farms tour start?
At the farm itself, 5730 Olohena Road, Kapaa, inland from the Wailua and Kapaa coast; there is no hotel pickup, and the tour ends where it starts.
Type "Lydgate Farms Chocolate Tour" into Google Maps or Waze, not just "Lydgate": that sends you to Lydgate Beach Park, the seaside park in Wailua that shares the family name. Directions come in the welcome email. Arrive 15 minutes early. From Kapaa it is a short drive inland; from Poipu or Princeville, allow 40 minutes to an hour.
What happens in the first part of the tour?
You walk the farm's botanical gardens with your guide, tasting estate honey and whatever tropical fruit is in season, and you see the vanilla vines.
Vanilla is an orchid that has to be pollinated by hand in Hawaii, and guests often mention watching their guide demonstrate it. Honey comes from the farm's own bees. Groups are capped at 25 travelers, and guests single out the guides more than anything else in their reviews.
Want the honey and vanilla walk? The tour runs Monday to Friday with free cancellation up to 24 hours before.
Check dates for the Lydgate Farms chocolate tourWhat do you learn about cacao?
How the pods grow on the trunk, what the fresh fruit tastes like, and how the seeds are fermented and dried before they become chocolate.
You taste the sweet white pulp around the seeds straight from a pod, which most visitors have never tried. Hawaii sits about 20 degrees north of the equator, at the edge of where cacao will grow, and it is the only US state that grows cacao commercially, so the guides spend time on what makes farming it here different.
Do you see chocolate being made?
Not on a factory line: this is a farm tour and tasting, and you learn the process rather than watch machines.
Reporting from 2023 and 2024 said the farm's bars were being made off the farm, on Oahu, from Lydgate beans, with a Kauai facility planned. Things may have moved on since, but book it for the orchard and the tasting, not for a factory. If a working factory is what you want, Ku'ia Estate on Maui includes one; see Hawaii's chocolate farm tours compared.
What is in the chocolate tasting?
A long guided tasting at the end of the walk: the listing's sample menu starts with dark chocolate covered Hawaiian macadamia nuts and a farm apple banana and builds to the 70% estate-grown bar.
Guests report tasting many kinds of chocolate, and some say they were "chocolated out" by the end, so keep some appetite. The farm shop comes last; purchases are not included in the ticket.
Is three hours too long?
For most guests no: it rates 4.9 from 1,105 reviews and many say it flew by, but a few reviewers say it runs a little long.
The first two hours are on your feet outdoors, so eat a light breakfast, bring water and pick the 9 AM start if you like cooler walking. The farm's own site lists starts at 9, 10 and 11 AM and noon, Monday to Friday.
Early starts are the coolest walk. Check which weekday times are open for your dates.
Check dates for the Lydgate Farms chocolate tourHow much walking is there?
Some: the paths cross grass and red dirt with steep, sloping sections, and the tour is not wheelchair accessible.
One guest in August 2026 wrote that there is walking up and down steep hills, but that the farm has golf cart accommodations for those who cannot manage them, so ask when you book. The listing also advises against it for people with heart problems or other serious medical conditions. See what to wear on the tour for shoes and bug spray.
Who should skip it?
Families with children under 9, anyone who can only go at the weekend, and visitors who just want a quick taste.
- Children under 9: not allowed, including infants in carriers; the farm points families to its tasting room in Kapaa, open Monday to Friday, 10 AM to 4 PM.
- Weekend-only plans: the farm tours run Monday to Friday.
- No car: there is no pickup, so drive, or book a taxi or rideshare both ways.
- You meant the beach: sightseeing tours that stop "at Lydgate" usually mean Lydgate Beach Park, not the farm.
No car, or only free at the weekend? This small-group day with pickup covers Wailua's falls, Lydgate Beach Park and Kapaa, where the farm's tasting room is. It is sightseeing, not a farm visit.
Explore the east Kauai sightseeing tourFrequently asked questions
How long is the Lydgate Farms chocolate tour?
About three hours, including the garden and orchard walk and a long tasting at the end.
Is Lydgate Farms the same as Lydgate Beach Park?
No. Lydgate Farms is inland at 5730 Olohena Road, Kapaa. Lydgate Beach Park is a seaside park on the Wailua coast that shares the family name.
Can you visit Lydgate Farms without a tour?
No. Farm visits require a tour reservation; there are no self-guided visits. The walk-in option is the tasting room in Kapaa town.
Do they run the tour in the rain?
Tours run in light rain, so bring a light rain jacket. On Viator you can cancel free up to 24 hours before if the forecast looks bad.
Ready to book
Choose your tasting
Free cancellation up to 24 hours before on every option. Prices are from-prices in USD and move with the season.
Kauai Chocolate Farm Tour & Tasting
- Three-hour guided tour of the Lydgate Farms cacao orchard and botanical gardens
- Tastes of estate honey, vanilla, tropical fruit and fresh cacao fruit
- Chocolate tasting, from chocolate-covered macadamias to the 70% estate bar
Princeville Botanical Gardens & Chocolate
- Guided walk through Princeville Botanical Gardens (terraces, creek beds, valley floor)
- Fruit and honey samples, then a tasting of single-origin chocolates from around the world
- Gratuity included; walking sticks, umbrellas and DEET-free bug spray provided
Organic Tropical Fruit Pick & Taste Tour
- Guided walk through the orchards and gardens of a nearly 30-acre organic farm
- Pick and taste the fruit in season from nearly 2,000 trees
- Small group of at most 10; wheelchair and stroller accessible
