🍎Peak harvest — come on out

Harvard, Massachusetts · an hour from Boston · family-run since 1936

The whole farm is ripe.

Pick-your-own under the old rows, fresh cider pressed on the hill, a farm store full of the harvest — and the Cider Barn pouring our hard ciders just up the lane. One drive, a whole day.

Plan Your Visit See a Day Here ↓

A Day at Carlson

Come for the apples. Stay the whole day.

◐ This itinerary shifts with the season — here's a peak-fall day.

🧺

Morning · 9 AM

Grab a bag, hit the rows

Pick up a half-peck bag at the barn and head out before the crowds. Weekday mornings are the quiet, golden-light ones — the best time to walk the trees.

🍩

Midday · Noon

Cider donuts & the farm store

Warm cider donuts straight from the fryer, a half-gallon of fresh-pressed cider, and a wander through the farm store for apple butter, local honey, and the harvest's best.

🍺

Afternoon · 2 PM

A flight at the Cider Barn

Just up the lane, the Cider Barn pours a flight of our hard ciders — dry to blueberry. Find a seat, watch the orchard, and let the kids run while you taste.

🌇

Golden hour · 5 PM

One more look at the hill

Load the trunk, catch the light coming low through the rows, and take home a box to ship to whoever couldn't make it. The Barn glows on after dark.

Pick Your Own

Take a bag out into the rows.

Cherries and blueberries in summer, the whole apple harvest come fall, and a few peaches in between. Grab a bag at the barn, pick what you like, and we'll weigh you out on the way back in.

Pick-Your-Own · In Season

Open Daily 9–5 · weekends to 6 at peak

Weekday mornings are the quiet ones. The rows are seasonal, but the farm store and the Cider Barn keep their own hours year-round — check the live board up top before you drive out.

What It Costs · Per Person

$12 / adult Includes a half-peck bag · kids under 5 free

Pick beyond your bag and we weigh the extra at the barn. No entry fee just to visit the store, the donuts, or the Cider Barn.

What to Bring

👟 Closed-toe shoes for the orchard rows
🧺 We hand out the bags — just bring your arms
💵 Cash or card, both fine at the barn
🧴 Sunscreen & a water bottle on warm days

🐕 Leashed, well-behaved dogs are welcome in the orchard.

Month Year

SuMoTuWeThFrSa

Open daily Busy weekend Event day

Open every day in season · 9 AM – 5 PM

🍺 The Barn Stays Open

Pick-your-own sleeps through winter — but the farm store and the Cider Barn are open all season. Sign up to hear the day the rows reopen.

🍺 The Cider Barn & Taproom

The reason a lot of folks come back.

We've pressed cider since 1936 — and these days a good part of it ferments into the hard ciders poured right here at the Barn. Order a flight, take a seat with the orchard out the window, and stay a while. It's the same fruit you just picked, a little further down the road.

Thu – Fri

12 – 8 PM

Saturday

11 – 8 PM

Sunday

11 – 6 PM

Hard ciders & flight shown are an illustrative lineup for this concept — your real menu drops straight in.

Tap a glass — taste the flight

Pouring

Five pours, orchard-dry to bramble-sweet. Tap one to see what's in the glass.

Orchard Dry

6.9% ABV

Pressed from the season's tart keepers and fermented bone-dry. Crisp, bright, a little of the russet's nuttiness on the finish. The one cider folks always order a second of.

🍎 Made from the apples you just walked past.

Reserve a Table Take a 4-pack Home →

Farm Store · Order & Ship

The harvest, boxed and ready to go.

Apples by the peck, cider pressed on the hill, the donuts everyone drives out for — and gift boxes we ship anywhere in the country for the people who couldn't make the trip.

🍎

Apple Peck

Your pick · McIntosh to Honeycrisp

$28

🍶

Fresh-Pressed Cider

Half-gallon · pressed on the hill

$11

🍩

Cider Donuts

Half-dozen · warm from the fryer

🍺

Hard Cider 4-Pack

16oz cans · mix the flight

$16

🥧

Apple Pie

9-inch · baked that morning

$18

🍯

Local Honey

Jar · from hives in the orchard

$12

🧈

Apple Butter

Jar · slow-cooked, small batch

$10

🎁

Harvest Gift Box

Ships nationwide · cider + treats

$54

📦 Free shipping on gift boxes over $75 — send the orchard anywhere.

On the Farm This Season

More than a bag of apples.

Sep27

Harvest Weekend

Sat & Sun · 10 AM – 5 PM

Wagon rides through the rows, live music at the Barn, the cider press running all weekend, and the first big push of pick-your-own.

Drop in all weekend Details

Oct18

Cider & Cheese Pairing

Sat · 2 PM – 4 PM

A guided flight of our hard ciders paired with local cheeses at the Barn — a sit-down tasting with the people who pressed it.

9 seats left Reserve

Nov08

Pie-Making Workshop

Sat · 11 AM – 1 PM

Roll, fill, and crimp your own apple pie with our bakers — take it home to bake, with a cider donut for the road.

5 spots left Reserve

Private & Corporate Events

Host it at the orchard.

The Cider Barn and the grounds host showers, rehearsal dinners, company offsites, and farm-to-table dinners — with the whole orchard as the backdrop. Tell us the date and the headcount and we'll send options.

Request Event Info →

Our Story

1936Four generations
on the same Harvard hill

One family. Nearly a century of cider.

Walter and Eleanor Carlson planted the first trees here in 1936, on a hill in Harvard with a long view and good drainage for apples. Four generations later, the family still works the rows — planting, pruning, pressing, and pouring, season after season.

What started as a roadside stand and a cider press has grown into a whole day out: pick-your-own through three seasons of fruit, a farm store that ships across the country, and a Cider Barn that turns the harvest into the hard ciders this corner of Massachusetts drives out for. The trees got older and the family got bigger — but the work, and the reason for it, hasn't changed.

We're not trying to be the biggest orchard around. We're trying to be the one people remember driving out to as a kid — and then bring their own kids back to.

The Carlson FamilyFour generations · Harvard, MA · since 1936