Hillside Harvest

Hillside Harvest is a family-run orchard and farm providore at 1209 The Escort Way, Borenore, about ten minutes west of Orange in the central west of NSW. It is best known for pick-your-own cherries in early summer, backed by a farm cafe and produce store, and leashed dogs are welcome to join you around the orchard grounds.

The dog setup

Well-behaved dogs on a lead are welcome in the orchard and outdoor picking areas. The hard line is the buildings: dogs are not permitted inside the farm store or the cafe, so plan on one person minding the dog outside while the other orders coffee or shops. Keep the lead short near the picking rows. This is a working orchard with uneven ground, other pickers moving buckets of fruit, and cherries at nose height, so a dog that lunges at new arrivals is a problem. As with any food-producing property, rules can tighten seasonally, so a quick call before a first visit is a sensible habit.

Worth knowing

Cherry picking runs roughly November into December and January, and the season shifts each year, so check their updates or call ahead for daily crop availability before driving out. Apples, pears, stonefruit, berries and figs follow later in the year. Picked fruit is paid for by the kilogram and buckets are provided. The cafe does coffee, light lunches and home baking, and the store stocks local jams, honey, regional cheeses and gifts, with grazing boxes to take under the trees or down by the dam.

Getting there and parking

The orchard sits on The Escort Way between Orange and Molong, with a large gravel and grass car park on site. Cherry-season weekends get busy, so an early start helps with both parking and picking. The cafe and store trade from 9am, closing at 5pm on weekdays, 4pm Saturdays and 3pm Sundays.

Close by with the dogs

The Escort Way doubles as a cellar door run. Heifer Station Wines is up the same road and welcomes dogs at its outdoor seating, and Small Acres Cyder on the Nashdale side pours its orchard ciders a short drive north. For fenced off-lead time, Machin Park Fenced Dog Park is in Orange itself.

More options are on the New South Wales dog friendly pubs guide and the Borenore destination page.

Max: cherry season weekends are the busiest days this farm sees all year. Arrive at opening, pick early, and let the dog settle under a tree before the rows fill up.