Week 0 | NC State at Virginia | Saturday, Aug. 29 | Scott Stadium, Charlottesville, VA | 3:30 p.m. ET
Funny how things work out. This game was supposed to be college football’s first trip to South America, with NC State and Virginia set to kick off Week 0 at Nilton Santos Stadium in Rio de Janeiro. Then the whole thing fell apart this summer when Athlete Advantage (the event organizer) told the ACC it simply couldn’t pull it off. So the Wolfpack and Cavaliers got rerouted back to the far less exotic — but far more practical — Blue Ridge foothills of Charlottesville instead.
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Virginia’s loss of a trip to Rio is your gain. Instead of fighting for a spot on a flight to Brazil, you can be standing on a mountaintop overlooking the Shenandoah Valley by 9 a.m. and in your tailgate spot by 1. Charlottesville sits right up against the Blue Ridge Parkway and the edge of Shenandoah National Park, which means some of the best hiking in Virginia is closer to Scott Stadium than most fans realize.
Here’s where to go — all within an hour of kickoff and none requiring a passport or conversational Portuguese.
10 minutes from Scott Stadium | Easy
The one to bring the whole crew, including grandparents and strollers. A 4.4-mile out-and-back on packed gravel and raised boardwalk, climbing gently through forest canopy up to the visitor center at Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello. Dog-friendly, wheelchair-accessible and shaded most of the way.
If anyone in your group wants to actually tour the house, that’s a separate ticket — $23 to $30 for adults, $10 for kids 5 to 11 — but the trail itself is free.
30 minutes from Scott Stadium | Easy
A change of pace from the usual mountain-view hike: a 4.6-mile out-and-back through an actual 1850s railroad tunnel carved straight through the mountain under Rockfish Gap. Bring a flashlight or headlamp — it gets really dark in there, and the temperature drops the deeper you go, which is an added bonus.
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25 minutes from Scott Stadium | $30 per vehicle | Moderate
If you’re only going to spend money on one thing this weekend besides the game, this is the one worth it. The Rockfish Gap entrance drops you right onto Skyline Drive, with two standout hikes an easy detour apart: Calvary and Chimney Rocks at milepost 90, a short trek out to a flat-topped rock overlook, and Turk Mountain at milepost 93.5, which delivers rock scrambles and real mountain views for the effort.
Being a national park, it will cost you an entry fee of $30 per vehicle, which is good for seven days.
35 minutes from Scott Stadium | Moderate
The pick if you’re looking to do a little soaking. A 3-mile out-and-back from the Sugar Hollow parking area leads to the Blue Hole, a genuinely beautiful swimming hole on the Moormans River. This spot keeps showing up on the “best swimming holes in Virginia” lists for a reason. Bring water shoes; the rocks get slick.
If your crew wants more of a workout instead, a separate 4.6-mile route from the same lot heads out to Big Branch Falls through a shaded forest.
30 minutes from Scott Stadium | Moderate-strenuous
The payoff hike, and the one most worth setting an alarm for. It’s a brutal, steep mile straight up, but the reward is a 360-degree view across the Shenandoah Valley and Blue Ridge that’s tough to beat anywhere in the state. This is the one hike on the list with zero shade at the top, so this is the one to knock out at sunrise, not after brunch. Sunrise at Humpback is a bucket-list item for many UVA students.
60–75 minutes from Scott Stadium | $3 day-use fee | Moderate-strenuous
Crabtree Falls is a series of five major cascades tumbling a total of 1,200 feet down the mountainside. For context, that’s taller than the Eiffel Tower. And the longest single cascade in that series drops 400 feet, enough to make Crabtree Falls the tallest single vertical-drop waterfall east of the Mississippi. The hike up alongside it is a 3-mile round trip with switchbacks and handrails at the steeper spots. It’s genuinely one of the most photographed trails in Virginia.
The catch: this one runs 60 to 75 minutes from Scott Stadium depending on route and traffic. If you’re rolling into Charlottesville just for the game, Crabtree probably isn’t the move. But if you’re making a weekend of it and have an extra day before or after, it’s worth the drive.
We should probably also mention there’s another Crabtree Falls off the Blue Ridge Parkway in North Carolina. Make sure you’re plugging the right one into your GPS.
Truthfully, you can’t go wrong no matter which trail you choose. Between the Blue Ridge Parkway, Shenandoah National Park and a reservoir system that seems to have a trail wrapped around every corner of it, Charlottesville is about as good as it gets for outdoor adventurers who also happen to love college football.
Every week this season, OutKick OutDoors is finding the best ways to touch grass before you touch down at the tailgate. Got a favorite spot near your campus we should know about? Hit us up on Instagram and TikTok.
