Once you escape the picture-perfect resort areas of Ka’anapali and Wailea, Maui unwinds in vast expanses of dry kiawe bush, lush bamboo forests, towering gulches, and green fields. While the central valley’s sugarcane is the most visible agricultural crop, there is a heck of a lot more growing on Maui’s volcanic slopes.

AgriTourism – exploring a place by visiting its farmers and ranchers – is taking hold on our island. Flip through any tourist magazine and you’ll find plenty of places offering to let you come and walk through their tropical flower garden, pet their goats, or pick fresh fruit from their jungle trees.

Most of these places are far from a resort, which means you might need to drive a few hours to explore. In other cases, the farms might be closed to visitors the day you go, leaving you disappointed in the driveway.

After taking a ride with local tour guide Jeannie Wenger of Maui Culinary Tours, we realized just how perfect an agri-tour can be for the food-oriented Maui visitor. Not only was Jeannie knowledgeable and down-to-earth, she was funny and incredibly helpful with questions, even those lobbed into left field. And while she talked, we relaxed and watched the incredible scenery roll by.

If you want to be chauffeured in comfort, showered with attention, and given the inside scoop, here are three companies – including Jeannie’s – which might fit your fancy if you’re in the mood to see where the food’s grown, or eat where the locals eat.

Maui Culinary Tours
This farm tour starts at the civilized hour of noon, leaving you plenty of morning snorkel time. After meeting in a central location you climb into an impeccably clean tour van with super-sparkly windows.

Lunch is the first stop – so come hungry – at one of the several locally-owned restaurants that feature the produce you’ll be visiting later on in the afternoon. After a relaxed meal and a chat with the chef, Jeannie Wenger, tour guide, takes you up Haleakala’s slopes. Way up at the top is Tedeschi Winery, famous for pineapple wine, and you’ll take a private tour and get a taste of their products.

As you wind down the mountain you’ll stop at a farmer’s market and a local farm, where you can talk to an expert in Maui’s land and what it can do. Eating fresh herbs, fruit, and vegetables picked out in the sunshine is the perfect way to spend an afternoon. Jeannie keeps the van well-stocked with water, snacks, and shopping bags to hold any goodies you pick up on the way.

If you prefer a custom tour, let her know. She can arrange cooking classes, winery and brewpub tours, ambles through fragrant coffee farms, in-person chef demonstrations, farmer’s market visits, and anything else you can think of. Perfect for the foodie bride and groom.

Maui Culinary Tours
$150 per person for tour & lunch
Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, 12pm pickup - 6pm return
6 person minimum
Reservations required - Call 808-283-5924
www.MauiCulinaryTours.com

Grown on Maui Tour
If you like to get started a little earlier, consider the Grown on Maui Tour, operated by Akina Aloha Tours. You’ll meet at Whole Foods Market in Kahului, where you’ll have the store to yourself for a private tour and what’s probably the best continental breakfast on Maui – all local fruits, coffee, and breads. A yummy start to the day.

Next stop is the Hali’imaile Pineapple Company, which quickly formed a few months ago to take over cultivation of the sweetest, most delicious pineapple on the planet – the Maui Gold – when Maui Land and Pineapple stopped growing the fruit. You’ll meet the people who saved our pineapple and learn how it’s grown.

Lunch is at O’o Farm, which is owned and operated by the folks who own I’o and Pacific’o restaurants in Lahaina (two of our favorites). A huge variety of organic crops are grown here for use in the restaurants … and you’ll get to sample the freshest in your gourmet meal cooked onsite.

For dessert you’ll visit the Ali’i Kula Lavender Farm, which smells as good as it sounds. Lavender chocolate gelato is only one of the many lavender-based foods, creams, and concoctions you’ll find here. After you walk the garden, you’ll be glad someone else is driving back down to Whole Foods and your car; so you can stay blissed out on lavender.

Grown on Maui Tour
$130 per person, exclusive of tax
Tuesdays, subject to availability, 8:30am start – 3pm return
10 person minimum
Reservations required, call 808-891-4604
www.AkinaTours.com

Tour Da Food
Bonnie Friedman is known on Maui for her culinary chops. Publicist to some of the island’s most celebrated chefs and restaurants, cookbook author, and travel writer, she may hail from Brooklyn, but her home is Maui. Whether you join her for breakfast, lunch in town, or a picnic meal, her intimate tours include plenty of food “the locals eat” as well as a never-ending flow of information about the island’s socio-ethnic history. Tours begin in the gorgeous ‘Iao Valley in Wailuku and progress from there. Breakfast is in a family-owned inn; lunch is at one (or several) of the local eateries in central Maui; the upcountry picnic tour features a lovely drive and the fresh breezes of Haleakala.

After filling you up, Bonnie will say Aloha with a list of her favorite eating places and a goodie bag. Whatever else you’ve eaten, you always end with shave ice.

Tour Da Food
$280 ~ $360 for two, depending upon the tour you choose
Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays subject to availability
Reservations required, see website for details and request form
www.TourDaFood.com

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