Heritage Hill Bed and Breakfast.

Overview

Cross Afton Mountain heading west from Crozet, and about twenty minutes down the far side you reach a colonial-style house set back on eight acres just inside the Waynesboro city limits. This is Heritage Hill, a bed and breakfast run by Scott and Dana Mares, where the front porch looks out on the Blue Ridge and the pastures roll away toward the mountains. The house runs to 4,300 square feet, old enough to have real history in its bones and renovated enough that the beds are comfortable and the plumbing modern. For anyone in Crozet who wants to sleep on the other side of the ridge for a night, it is close enough to feel like a local getaway and far enough to feel like one.

The location is the quiet argument for the place. Heritage Hill sits about six miles from the spot where Skyline Drive hands off to the Blue Ridge Parkway and the Appalachian Trail crosses through, which makes it a natural staging point if you are driving the ridge or hiking a stretch of the AT. Charlottesville is roughly thirty minutes east. So you get the paradox the innkeepers themselves point out: private acreage and a rural view, but town amenities a few minutes away.

About the innkeepers

Scott and Dana Mares have wanted to run a bed and breakfast since they stayed in one on their honeymoon more than thirty years ago. They started looking in 2016, once the last of their four children left for college, and they say they knew this house was the one the moment they saw it. Since then they have spent their time renewing and remodeling with guests in mind, and they describe the work as ongoing rather than finished.

That history matters to how the place feels. This is not a hotel with a front desk and a shift schedule; it is a home where the owners live and host, and the reviews returning guests leave tend to land on the same two things: Dana's breakfasts and the couple's easy hospitality. Guests mention Dana taking dietary limitations into account, answering questions quickly, and steering them toward things to do nearby.

The rooms and the mornings

The guest rooms are furnished in a historical register — antique pieces, period touches — but kept fully modern and functional, so you get the character without giving up comfort. One is known as the Blue Room. Beyond the bedrooms, there is a common living room downstairs with comfortable seating, and just outside the guest rooms a small station with a refrigerator, a coffee maker, tea, and snacks for whenever you want them. Outdoors, there is a seating area and a fire pit for the evening.

Breakfast is the anchor of a stay here, served in the downstairs dining room and shared with the other guests. Expect fresh coffee, juice, a fruit plate, homemade baked goods, and a hot dish to follow — the kind of morning where the food and the company both do some of the work. Guests have described everything from quiche and eggs to souffle and house-made scones, all made in the kitchen and served at the table rather than laid out on a buffet line.

Planning a stay

Heritage Hill is a small, hosted inn, so booking ahead is the way to go rather than assuming a room is open. You can look at the rooms and amenities and reserve through the inn's own site at heritagehillbnb.com, and there is a dedicated accommodations page with the room details. The property is at 1169 Sherwood Ave, Waynesboro, VA 22980, and you can reach the innkeepers at (540) 471-8998.

For Crozet folks, the pitch is simple. You do not have to drive far or plan a whole trip to feel like you have gone somewhere. An anniversary, a slow weekend, a night before an early start on Skyline Drive — Heritage Hill is the sort of place where you wake up to a mountain view, a real breakfast, and hosts who are genuinely glad you came. That is a lot to get for a short drive over the mountain.

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