By Amy Wolf, Sunset travel editor

Let’s say you’ve had it with lounging on the beach and drinking mai tais in Maui. Not likely, true, but let’s just pretend. What else is there to do?

Here’s what: Get thyself to Kapalua Resort for a Maui Gold Pineapple Tour. Priced at $39.95 (express tour) to $65 (full three-hour tour) including samples and a pineapple to take home, it’s one of the best cultural experiences Maui has to offer.

As you ride a funky yellow bus through muddy puddles up a bumpy hill your tour guide will regale you with facts about pineapple (who knew there are over 200 kinds of pineapple, that it's a super antioxidant, or that it’s easy to grow your own pineapple simply by potting the crown?) and point out where the plantation workers used to live. Once off the bus you'll traipse through pineapple fields with a view of Kapalua Bay. When your tour guide picks a golden pineapple and whacks off big slices for you to taste before tossing the still-full-of-meat pineapple back into the dirt, you might find yourself shouting: "Wait, I'll eat that!," as I almost did.

Then you bite into your chunk. It's the sweetest taste imaginable. It's also messy sticky and the strings get stuck in your teeth, but who cares? Now you know what pineapple is supposed to taste like.

Maui Gold Pineapple Tour: 808/665-5491