The peaceful neighbourhood of Winter Park offers an arty escape that feels a world away from Florida\u2019s theme park capital<\/p>\n
Click here to download and save as a PDF<\/a><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Through a canopy of palm fronds and Spanish moss, I feel the warmth of dappled sunlight on my face as I float through a canal, admiring the huge houses and even bigger backyards of the rich and famous.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n This affluent Orlando suburb was founded in the 1880s as a place for wealthy New Englanders to seek solace from the ice and snow, hence its name, Winter Park.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n It has retained that sleepy, upmarket character, despite being only a 15-minute drive\u00a0from\u00a0downtown Orlando.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n I\u2019m on a 45-minute tour of Winter Park with Scenic Boat Tours, which costs $20 for adults and $10 for children. Skipper Wayne Osley sets the tone: \u201cOur boat tours have been running for 87 years, and today you\u2019re going to see some beautiful places.\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n A network of bamboo-lined canals connects three lakes in Winter Park: Osceola, Virginia and Maitland.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Lake Virginia is home to Rollins College, Florida\u2019s oldest university, but with lakeside dorms featuring pools, it\u2019s no ordinary college campus.<\/p>\n Picture: Visit Orlando\/Judy Watson Tracy<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n I spy students taking a break to soak up the Florida sunshine on loungers, or paddleboarding on the water. On Lake Osceola, white-panelled Victorian cottages and 1920s Mediterranean-style mansions dominate.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n But as we pass through the Venetian Canal to Lake Maitland, flora and fauna take over.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Two owls sit in the high branches of a 250-year-old southern pine tree, surveying us as we pass, while an anhinga waterbird spreads its giant wings to dry in the sun.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n After rounding off the tour at a house with giant sculptures of Mickey and Minnie Mouse \u2013 in case we\u2019ve forgotten which city we\u2019re in \u2013 I wander to Winter Park\u2019s charming Park Avenue, where clients will find the Charles Hosmer Morse Museum of American Art.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Inside is the world\u2019s largest collection of glass art by Louis Comfort Tiffany, art nouveau extraordinaire and son of the famous jeweller.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Stained-glass windows are the real showstoppers, but lamps, iridescent crockery and even a Byzantine-style chapel Tiffany built for the 1893 Chicago World\u2019s Fair provide plenty for connoisseurs to pore over.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Across the road at Boca restaurant, I find the perfect cocktail for toasting my Winter Park experience \u2013 a smoky winter spritz. Here\u2019s to finding unexpected gems in the theme park capital of the world.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Book it: Gold Medal sells a seven-night stay at the Hilton Hotel Orlando Downtown from \u00a3989 per person, based on two adults and two children sharing a Queen Room. The price includes breakfast, car hire and flights from Heathrow departing May 25, 2027.
goldmedal.co.uk<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The peaceful neighbourhood of Winter Park offers an arty escape that feels a world away from Florida\u2019s theme…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":411298,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[139,141,140],"class_list":["post-411297","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-orlando","tag-orlando","tag-orlando-headlines","tag-orlando-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/411297","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=411297"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/411297\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/411298"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=411297"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=411297"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=411297"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}