A mountaintop orchard where the view is the product, entry is free on weekdays and shoulder weekends, and the peak-weekend pass buys you three hours and a car park — not apples, hayrides or pumpkins.
Entry is free on weekdays and on non-peak weekends (early September and late November). On peak fall weekends an entry pass is required for ages 12 and up: Single Entry Pass $10 per person, Anytime Pass $20 (usable once on any ticketed day), Season Pass $25 (unlimited visits on 2026 ticketed weekends). Under 12 free. Passes cover the grounds, Country Store & Bakery, Wine Shop and Bold Rock taproom but include no fruit - apple picking, hayrides and special events are paid separately.
Rough cost for a family of four: about $40.00 in admission alone at the posted starting rate, before pumpkins, food, parking or any add-on listed above. Most families end up well north of that once they are through the gate.
Before anything else: the map pin on this listing is wrong, and we would rather say so than let you find out on a mountain road. The orchard’s address is a private mountain trail that the US Census geocoder returned no match for, so the coordinates recorded here fall back to central Charlottesville, about four miles away. Use the orchard’s own directions.
On a peak fall weekend, anyone 12 and over needs an entry pass. What that pass buys is precisely defined and narrower than most people assume: the grounds, the Country Store and Bakery, the Wine Shop and the Bold Rock Hard Cider taproom. It buys no fruit. Apple picking, hayrides and special events are all separate charges on top.
In other words, this is a gate fee for access to a mountaintop and a set of buildings, not an all-inclusive farm ticket in the way Cox Farms or Temple Hall use the term. That is not a criticism — the view over Charlottesville is genuinely the draw, and plenty of visitors come to sit with a cider and look at the Blue Ridge. But a family expecting the $10 to cover a bag of apples will be recalculating at the till.
A Single Entry Pass is $10 per person. An Anytime Pass is $20, usable once on any ticketed day. A Season Pass is $25 for unlimited visits on 2026 ticketed weekends.
The Anytime Pass is the odd one. It costs twice a single entry and still admits you once — the whole premium is date flexibility. Take it only if you genuinely cannot pick a weekend, and note that passes are refundable only until 11:59pm the day before, so the flexibility does have some value if your plans are weather-dependent.
The Season Pass breaks even against single entries on the third visit. For a Charlottesville or Albemarle household that will come more than twice, it is obviously right. For anyone driving in from Richmond or Northern Virginia for one October Saturday, it is $15 wasted.
Weekdays are free. Early-September and late-November weekends are free. That is a substantial share of the season at no cost. If your reason for coming is the view, the store, the bakery and a drink — which for a lot of adult visitors it is — a Tuesday in October delivers all of it for nothing, in better light and without a three-hour clock running.
On ticketed days each pass allows a visit of up to three hours, with entry slots ending at 4:00pm. That is enough, but it is not leisurely if you intend to pick fruit, eat, drink something and take the view. Build the visit in that order and do the picking early, remembering that last pick-your-own entry is an hour before closing.
Vehicles over 20 feet are turned away on ticketed days because of the mountain road. That should tell you what the drive is like: narrow, winding, and shared on October weekends with everyone else in central Virginia who wants elevation and colour. Leaf season and apple season peak together here. Leaving early is not fussiness on this particular mountain — it is the difference between a pleasant climb and half an hour in a queue on a single-lane approach.
A mountaintop in October is colder, windier and clearer than the town below. Bring a layer more than you think Charlottesville’s forecast justifies. The upside is that the season here starts earlier and the air is better than in the Piedmont at the same date — an early-October afternoon down in Richmond can still be hot, while up here it is properly autumn.
Weekdays and non-peak weekends are free, and that is the cheapest and calmest way to see the mountain. The 2026 ticketed fall weekends are September 12-13, 19-20 and 25-27; October 2-4, 9-12 including Columbus Day, 16-18, 23-25 and 30-November 1; and November 7-8 and 14-15. Hours are 9:00am to 6:00pm in September and October and 9:00am to 5:00pm in November. On ticketed days entry slots run 9:00am to 4:00pm and each pass allows a visit of up to three hours, with last pick-your-own entry an hour before closing. An early slot on a ticketed weekend gets you the morning light over Charlottesville before the road fills.
Three hours, because on ticketed days that is literally what the pass allows. On a free weekday you can take longer, but three hours is a fair estimate for the orchard, the store, the bakery and a drink.
The ticketed-weekend system exists because of the crowds — this is one of the best-known mountain destinations in central Virginia and October is leaf season as well as apple season. The approach is a narrow private mountain road, which means the bottleneck is the drive, not the gate. Advance reservation is recommended, though walk-ups are taken if capacity allows.
On the mountain, reached by a narrow private road with a 20-foot vehicle length limit on ticketed days. Surface is not published. The road, rather than the lot, is the constraint here.
Not published. The store, bakery, wine shop and taproom are the accessible core of the visit; the pick-your-own rows are orchard ground on a mountainside. The 20-foot vehicle limit rules out larger adapted vehicles on ticketed days, which is worth a call to 434-977-3833 before travelling.
You want a pumpkin patch. Pumpkins here are ready-picked rather than a field to wander, and this is an apple orchard first — the addendum for this region holds true, mountain listings are usually orchards with pumpkins attached. Skip it if you drive anything over 20 feet, because vehicles that long cannot be accommodated on ticketed days due to the narrow mountain road. And skip a peak Saturday if you want to linger; the pass holds you to three hours.
Only on peak fall weekends, and only if you are 12 or over. Entry is free on weekdays and on non-peak weekends in early September and late November. The 2026 ticketed weekends run from September 12-13 through November 14-15.
Access to the grounds, the Country Store and Bakery, the Wine Shop and the Bold Rock taproom. It does not include any fruit — apple picking, hayrides and special events are billed separately.
Each pass allows a visit of up to three hours, with entry slots running 9:00am to 4:00pm. Last pick-your-own entry is one hour before closing.
Yes. Vehicles longer than 20 feet cannot be accommodated on ticketed days because of the narrow mountain road.
September 12 – November 15, 2026. Daily. Hours: 9:00am-6:00pm in September and October, 9:00am-5:00pm in November. On ticketed days, entry time slots run 9:00am-4:00pm and each pass allows a visit of up to 3 hours; last pick-your-own entry is one hour before closing..
Admission starts at $10 per person. Entry is free on weekdays and on non-peak weekends (early September and late November). On peak fall weekends an entry pass is required for ages 12 and up: Single Entry Pass $10 per person, Anytime Pass $20 (usable once on any ticketed day), Season Pass $25 (unlimited visits on 2026 ticketed weekends). Under 12 free. Passes cover the grounds, Country Store & Bakery, Wine Shop and Bold Rock taproom but include no fruit - apple picking, hayrides and special events are paid separately.
1435 Carters Mountain Trail, Charlottesville, VA 22902, in Albemarle County. It is one of 4 patches we track in Richmond Region.
We track 4 patches in Richmond Region, 1 of which are free to walk into. At $10 a head this one sits right on the regional median of $10, undercutting 1 of the 3 paid patches we track here.
Its season runs about 65 days against a regional average of 45, so it is a notably longer window than most of its neighbours, which takes the pressure off picking a weekend.
What sets it apart locally: it has a market, bakery or taproom, which most Richmond Region patches on our list do not.
Map pin is set to the town centre. Navigate to the street address above, not the pin.
chilesfamilyorchards.com
Checked August 2026.