Orlando Layover Near Winter Park Station
Part of the full Orlando Layover: ICON Park and Lake Eola, MCO
Winter Park Station stands across Central Park from Park Avenue’s brick shopfronts, north of downtown Orlando, with an hour-long lake tour that has run since 1938 at one end of Morse Boulevard and a 1932 college chapel tower ten minutes’ walk the other way.
The chain of lakes and canals behind Park Avenue
The boat tour has left from the east end of Morse Boulevard since 1938: an hour on a pontoon across three of the town’s lakes, threaded together by two narrow man-made canals. Adults pay $20 and children aged two to eleven pay $10. The route runs past the backs of houses and gardens that no road reaches, and along the Rollins College waterfront on Lake Virginia.
Anyone who would rather have the day arranged in advance can line it up on a tours and activities platform.
Knowles Memorial Chapel on the Rollins College campus
Ralph Adams Cram, the American Gothic Revival architect who worked on St. John the Divine in New York, built something quite different here: a Mediterranean Revival chapel of white stucco with a tiered bell tower, dedicated on 29 March 1932 and now on the National Register of Historic Places. It stands on the Rollins campus about ten minutes’ walk south of the platform, which is close enough to see on the way back from the water.
Park Avenue and the lanes running off it are laid in brick rather than asphalt, and a suitcase’s wheels find every joint.
A peacock on the weather vane over Winter Park’s depot
The depot at 148 West Morse Boulevard opened in March 2014, white gabled roofs in the Craftsman style to match the older buildings around it, with a peacock on the weather vane because the bird is Winter Park’s official symbol. Amtrak’s long-distance trains to Miami call here alongside the commuter service, and it carries more passengers than any station on the line except the one in downtown Orlando.
The catch is the timetable. SunRail runs Monday to Friday and not at all on Saturdays, Sundays or public holidays, so this whole itinerary exists only on weekdays. Getting back out to Orlando International Airport (MCO) means riding south to Lynx Central Station and changing to LYNX Link 11, about 45 minutes more for a flat $2; a car does the same journey in roughly half an hour. The downtown route around Lake Eola is the weekend answer instead. The Morse Museum’s Tiffany chapel sits two blocks off Park Avenue if you want the indoor half of a Winter Park afternoon.
Left at a storage point, the bag stops arguing with the brickwork, and Winter Park becomes what it is best at: a slow hour on the water, a walk under live oaks, and a train back that you can set your watch by, as long as it is not a Saturday.
Frequently asked questions
What should I do during a layover near Winter Park Station in Orlando?
Take the hour-long lake tour that has run out of Morse Boulevard since 1938, $20 for adults, which crosses three of the town's lakes and squeezes through two man-made canals between them. Rollins College is a ten-minute walk from the platform, with Ralph Adams Cram's 1932 chapel tower on the campus and the Morse Museum's Tiffany collection two blocks off Park Avenue. Five hours covers all three, but only on a weekday: the commuter trains that make this trip worth doing do not run at all at the weekend.
How much does the Winter Park lake tour cost, and how long is it?
One hour, $20 for adults and $10 for children aged two to eleven, leaving from the east end of Morse Boulevard. The route takes in three of the town's lakes and the two narrow man-made canals cut between them.
Is Park Avenue walkable from the train platform?
Yes, and it is the reason to get off here. The station fronts Central Park, a long green strip, with Park Avenue's shopfronts directly across it, so the walk is a couple of minutes and flat the whole way. The surface is brick rather than asphalt, which matters more for luggage wheels than for feet.
How do you get from Winter Park to the airport?
There is no direct connection. The commuter train runs south to Lynx Central Station in downtown Orlando, and LYNX Link 11 covers the rest to Orlando International Airport (MCO) in about 45 minutes for $2. Allow three hours for the whole chain, or take a car and do it in about half that.