Somebody drives out to Auburn Heights on a random Saturday afternoon, phone in hand, ready to see the antique steam cars everyone keeps mentioning. The gate is closed. There's a small sign about "first Sundays only." They turn around and don't try again for another year, sometimes longer.
This happens more than you'd think, even to people who've lived in the 19707 zip code for a decade. It happens because Auburn Heights gets talked about like a place you visit, when it actually behaves like an appointment. You don't drop in. You show up on the day it's open, or you don't see it at all.
The Marshall Steam Museum at Auburn Heights Preserve, tucked off Creek Road in Yorklyn about five minutes from the center of Hockessin, runs its public Steamin' Days on the first Sunday of the month, June through November, from 12:30 to 4:30 in the afternoon. Not every weekend. Not even every Sunday in a given month. One date, once a month, for six months a year.
Today is August 9. August's Sunday already came and went on the 2nd. That leaves exactly three chances left in 2026: September 6, October 4, and November 1.
What You're Actually Showing Up To See
Auburn Heights isn't a roadside attraction dressed up for tourists. It's a 1897 Queen Anne mansion built by Israel and Elizabeth Marshall, occupied by three generations of the same family, and gifted to Delaware State Parks in 2008 along with the surrounding acreage. The Marshalls' antique automobile collection, including the world's largest operating fleet of Stanley steam cars, went to a nonprofit called the Friends of Auburn Heights, which is who actually runs the Steamin' Days. The estate now carries the designation Auburn Valley State Park, more than 360 acres against Red Clay Creek.
On a Steamin' Day, you can ride the Auburn Valley Railroad's 1/8-scale trains, one coal-fired and one diesel, circling the property. You can climb into a hundred-year-old car for a lap around the grounds. You can tour the mansion itself, with guided walk-throughs offered every twenty minutes and the last one going out at 3:40. Tickets are sold at the gate, no advance purchase needed, and the whole thing runs rain or shine.
That last detail matters more than it sounds. A lot of Delaware's outdoor calendar gets weather-canceled without much notice. Auburn Heights doesn't play that game. If the date is the date, the date is the date.
The Three Sundays Left, And What Each One Is Actually For
Not every first Sunday plays the same. If you're deciding which one to build a weekend around, here's the honest breakdown:
- September 6 – Still summer-warm, still green, lighter crowds than October. This is the low-commitment entry point if you've never been and just want the popcorn, the trains, and a short mansion tour without planning around it.
- October 4 – Likely the color month. Better for a longer visit, better for photos, better if you're hosting out-of-town guests who want the postcard version of a Delaware fall. Expect more people.
- November 1 – The last call before the season closes for the year. Cooler, quieter, smaller turnout. If you've got young kids who do better without a crowd, or grandparents who'd rather not stand in a line, this is the friendlier date.
Miss all three and you're waiting until next June.
Mt. Cuba Runs On A Different Clock, And That's The Point
About ten minutes from Auburn Heights sits Mt. Cuba Center, the native plant garden on Barley Mill Road that was once the private estate of Pamela and Lammot du Pont Copeland before opening to general admission in 2013. Mt. Cuba's gardens are open Tuesday through Sunday, not appointment-only, with the season stretching into mid-November before the grounds close for winter.
That's a different rhythm than Auburn Heights, and knowing the difference saves you a wasted trip. You can visit Mt. Cuba on basically any day of the week through the fall. You can only catch Auburn Heights on three specific Sundays. Treating them like the same kind of outing, something you'll "get to eventually," is how people end up seeing neither.
Mt. Cuba's own team has flagged three headline events for the back half of this season: a hayride, a Nature Play Day, and a Tree Festival, tied to the garden's fall foliage stretch. Pair one of those with a different-weekend visit to Auburn Heights and you've got a fall that doesn't feel repetitive, because you're not showing up to the same kind of thing twice. One is a walk through native meadows and woodland trails. The other is popcorn, steam whistles, and a Victorian mansion.
Hockessin Keeps Its Own Calendar
None of this runs on a college semester or a downtown business district's event schedule, the way Newark or the Wilmington Riverfront do. Hockessin's fall gets built out of things like this: a museum that opens six days a year, a garden with its own foliage window, a library running a family movie series through November tied to America's 250th anniversary, and a Fourth of July tradition that's been going almost fifty years running.
Ask around and you'll find plenty of longtime residents who've been to Auburn Heights exactly once, usually the first year they moved here, usually by accident. That's not a knock on the place. It's just what happens when something only opens six days a year and nobody tells you which six.
Picking Your Sunday
If you've got out-of-town guests coming through and want the full show, October 4 gives you the color and a longer visit worth the drive. If you're bringing small kids who do better without a crowd, November 1 is the gentler option, smaller turnout, still the trains and the popcorn. If you just want to see what the fuss is about without overplanning it, September 6 is the easiest entry point.
Either way, pick one and put it on the calendar now. The whole point of a first-Sunday schedule is that it doesn't wait around for you to get to it eventually.
If you're weighing a move within Hockessin, or into it, and want a read on how a specific street or block actually lives day to day, not just what's listed, that's the kind of local detail worth a conversation. Let's Connect with Will Webber.
