A three-hour one-day farm market festival charged at $5 cash per car rather than per person — outstanding value for a big family, and a date the grove had not yet set for 2026 when we checked.
$5 cash per car to enter (2025 event). Food, rides and vendor purchases are extra.
Rough cost for a family of four: about $20.00 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.
Almost every priced attraction in this directory charges by the head, which is why a $5-per-car gate is worth writing about on its own. Two adults and four children pay the same as one person driving alone. For a large family, or two families in a people carrier, this is the cheapest way to get through a fall festival gate anywhere in Florida — and unlike a free church lot, there is a genuine event on the other side of it: hayrides, a petting zoo, u-pick, bounce houses, face painting, a slingshot, food trucks and a market of craft and produce vendors.
The catch is the window. Three hours, on one Saturday, once a year. That is a completely different kind of commitment from a farm running eight weekends, and it changes the advice. There is no strategy for beating the crowds by picking a quiet day, because there is only one day. The only lever you have is arriving at 11am rather than drifting in at half past twelve, by which point the bounce houses and the food trucks will have queues and you will have paid a full gate for ninety minutes.
When we read the grove’s event page in August 2026, the listed festival was Saturday, November 15, 2025. No 2026 date had been posted. We have deliberately left the season fields empty rather than assuming the same weekend repeats, because on a one-day event a guess is worse than a blank.
That November timing is also worth thinking about if it holds. A mid-November festival in Indian River County is a much more pleasant three hours than the same event in early October would be, and it puts the whole thing after Halloween — which means this is a harvest festival at a citrus grove rather than a pumpkin run. If your specific errand is buying a pumpkin, do that elsewhere and come here for the day out.
The published figure was $5 cash per car. Not $5, card accepted. Farm market gates are frequently cash-only, the vendors inside often are too, and the nearest cash machine to a grove on 12th Street is not somewhere you want to be driving with a car full of children at 11.15am. Take notes.
There is only one time: the event ran 11am to 2pm on a single Saturday, and the most recent one we could find listed was in mid-November 2025 rather than October. No 2026 date has been published. If the pattern holds, a November date is actually good news — Indian River County in November is dramatically more comfortable than it is in October, and a three-hour midday window that would be punishing in early autumn is manageable later in the year. Arrive at 11am rather than at noon; a three-hour event has no quiet middle.
The full three hours, or as much of them as your family can use. With hayrides, a petting zoo, u-pick, bounce houses, face painting, a slingshot, food trucks and a vendor market packed into one window, arriving at 1pm means paying the same $5 for a third of the event.
A one-day, three-hour event concentrates an entire county's interest into one window, and that is the trade-off for the price. Expect the middle hour, roughly noon to 1pm, to be the crush, with queues for the bounce houses and the food trucks rather than for entry.
The $5 charge is levied per car at the entrance, which tells you parking is on site and managed. This is a grove and farm market, so expect grass or packed dirt rather than asphalt, and mud if it has rained in the preceding day.
You need a fixed plan. This is a single Saturday of the year, three hours long, and the 2026 date had not been announced when we checked. It is also the wrong choice if you specifically want a pumpkin — the activity list is a harvest festival with u-pick, and the most recent edition ran after Halloween.
Vero Beach's other Indian River County fall options run on longer October seasons, so the sensible approach is to treat this as a bonus if the date lands well rather than as the anchor of a fall plan.
It was $5 cash per car at the 2025 event. That is the entry charge for the whole vehicle, not per person. Food, rides and vendor purchases are separate.
None have been published. The event page listed Saturday, November 15, 2025, 11am to 2pm, when we read it in August 2026. Because that is last year's date we have left the 2026 season blank rather than guessing.
2026 dates had not been published when we last checked. In past seasons it has run: One-day Saturday event. Check with the farm before driving out.
Admission starts at $5 per person. $5 cash per car to enter (2025 event). Food, rides and vendor purchases are extra.
6100 12th Street, Vero Beach, FL 32966, in Indian River County. It is one of 5 patches we track in Treasure Coast.
We track 5 patches in Treasure Coast, 3 of which are free to walk into. At $5 a head this one sits below the regional median of $18, undercutting 1 of the 2 paid patches we track here.
What sets it apart locally: it has hayrides, u-pick fields, which most Treasure Coast patches on our list do not.
One caveat worth repeating: this farm had not published its 2026 dates when we last checked, while 3 of the 5 patches we track in Treasure Coast had. Treat any date you see elsewhere as last year's until the farm confirms it.
schachtgroves.com
Checked August 2026.