Located in beautiful downtown Winter Park, the Scenic Boat Tour offers hour-long guided cruises through the lakes and canals in the Winter Park chain. Since 1938, Winter Park's World Famous Scenic Boat Tour has given enjoyment to thousands. Winter Park sits among the Winter Park Chain of Lakes, a series of lakes interconnected by navigable canals. Winter Park has a total area of 10.2 square miles, of which 1.5 square miles is water. The canals were originally created for flood control and to run logs to a sawmill on present-day Lake Virginia.
The Scenic Boat Tour dock is fewer than five minutes from Park Avenue, at the east end of Morse Boulevard on Lake Osceola. The Winter Park Scenic Boat Tour pitches itself to first-time visitors seeking flora and fauna and to Orlando locals seeking an off-the-beaten-path experience. The Scenic Boat Tour has a fleet of six pontoon boats. All tours are first-come, first-serve, and private tours and groups larger than eighteen passengers can be booked in advance by phone. Scenic Boat Tour admission is twenty dollars for adults and ten dollars for children ages 2 to 11. The Scenic Boat Tour is closed Christmas Day.
Winter Park is often seen as a popular destination for those visiting Orlando who want an escape from the typical tourist scene of the Orlando theme parks. Highlights from the Scenic Boat Tour include local wildlife and natural scenery, mansions and historic homes, Rollins College, Kraft Azalea Gardens, and Isle of Sicily. In 1886, the Seminole Hotel on Lake Osceola opened.
In 1885, the Congregational Assembly of Florida started Rollins College, the state's first four-year college. Rollins College is in Winter Park, Florida, across from Park Avenue. The Rollins campus features Spanish and Mediterranean Revival style architecture. The Rollins College Alfond Boathouse sits on Lake Virginia. The Cornell Fine Arts Museum is located on the Rollins grounds and contains works of art and objects from antiquity to the 21st century. The Annie Russell Theatre is located on the campus of Rollins College. Until the 1960s, the Dinky Line had a stop at Lake Virginia and Rollins College at the city park now known as Dinky Dock.
The Charles Hosmer Morse Museum of American Art houses the most comprehensive collection of the works of Louis Comfort Tiffany found anywhere. The museum was founded by Jeannette Genius McKean in 1942 and dedicated to Chicago industrialist Charles Hosmer Morse, her grandfather. In 1955, the McKeans organized the first exhibition of works by Louis Comfort Tiffany since the artist's death in 1933. The museum opened at its current location on Park Avenue in 1995. The museum now has more than 19,000 square feet of public and exhibition space.
The Tiffany collection at the Morse Museum ranges from award-winning leaded-glass windows down to glass buttons. The Tiffany Chapel was fully reassembled and opened in April 1999 to the general public for the first time in more than 100 years. The Tiffany Chapel is approximately 39 feet long and 23 feet wide, rising at its highest point to about 24 feet. In February 2011, the Morse opened a wing with 6,000 square feet of gallery space for objects from Tiffany's Long Island estate, Laurelton Hall. At the Morse, the Laurelton Hall audio tour of twenty-seven stops begins in the Laurelton Hall introductory gallery and concludes in the Tiffany Chapel.
The Morse has over 800 pieces in its 19th-century American Art Pottery collection, including about 300 Rookwood pieces. The Morse provides complimentary audio tours of its collection that are accessible via cellphone. Morse Museum hours are Tuesday through Saturday, 9:30 AM to 4 PM. Morse Museum admission is free Fridays from 4 to 8 PM, November through April. The Charles Hosmer Morse Museum of American Art is at 445 North Park Avenue, Winter Park. The Morse Museum is a five-minute walk from the SunRail station.
Scenic Olde Winter Park is punctuated by small, winding brick streets and a canopy of old southern live oak and camphor trees, draped with Spanish moss. The Saturday Farmers' Market takes place every Saturday morning from 8 AM to 1 PM in Central Park West Meadow, at the corner of New York Avenue and Morse Boulevard.
Annual festivals in Winter Park include the Bach Festival, the nationally ranked Sidewalk Art Festival, and the Winter Park Concours d'Elegance. Peacocks often roam around Winter Park neighborhoods. Much of the old Dinky Line right of way has been converted to the Cady Way Trail, a pedestrian and biking path. The Albin Polasek Museum and Sculpture Gardens is at 633 Osceola Avenue, Winter Park. The Casa Feliz Historic Home Museum is at 656 North Park Avenue, Winter Park. Kraft Azalea Garden is at 1365 Alabama Drive, Winter Park. Kraft Azalea Park is located alongside of Lake Maitland.
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