ORLANDO · FLORIDA
Where the theme parks are just the start.
Walt Disney World and Universal, of course. But also rocket launches on the Space Coast, glass-bottom kayaks on 72-degree springs, airboats through the sawgrass and dinner shows after dark.
Only in Central Florida
Three things Central Florida does like nowhere else.
Theme parks, boat rides and clear water turn up all over. Four theme-park worlds in one city, a working spaceport you can walk into, and springs this clear do not.
Four parks, one city
The Theme Park Capital
Walt Disney World on its own is four parks the size of a town, with its own roads and monorail. Add Universal’s parks and the new Epic Universe, SeaWorld, LEGOLAND and the water parks, and Orlando holds more major theme parks than anywhere on Earth. It is why 70 million people a year fly in.
- 1 SeaWorld Orlando: Park Admission Ticket
- 2 Orlando: Everglades Airboat Ride and Wildlife Park Ticket
- 3 LEGOLAND Florida Theme Park Admission Tickets
Launch country
The Space Coast
An hour east on the coast, Kennedy Space Center is the only place in the country where astronauts still launch for orbit, and on the right morning you can watch a rocket leave the planet. The rest of the year you walk beneath the Saturn V and stand next to a flown shuttle.
- 1 Kennedy Space Center with Transport from Orlando and Kissimmee
- 2 From Orlando: Kennedy Space Center Trip with Transport
- 3 Kennedy Space Center Cape Canaveral Admission
72 degrees, all year
The Crystal Springs
Central Florida floats on hundreds of freshwater springs that run a steady 72 degrees and stay clear enough to read the riverbed from a glass-bottom kayak. Manatees winter in them, and at Silver Springs the boats have had glass floors since the 1870s.
- 1 Glass Bottom Kayak Eco Tour through Rainbow Springs
- 2 Glass Bottom Kayak Tours of Silver Springs
- 3 Silver Springs Clear Kayak Manatee, Monkey & Wildlife Adventures
The one everyone books
Orlando's single most popular day out.
More people book this than anything else on the site. If you only lock in one thing before you fly, this is the safe bet.
The classics
Orlando's Most Popular Tours & Tickets
Airboat rides, space-center trips, clear-kayak springs and the big park passes. The days most people book first.
Where to begin
The days an Orlando trip is built around.
Park tickets, airboat rides, the space center, the springs and the dinner shows. The categories most Orlando trips are planned around, and the best of each.
The big question
How to do the theme parks.
Orlando has more theme parks than a normal trip has days, so the real question is which ones. Here is how the big names stack up, and who each one is for.
The spring runs
Glass kayaks on 72-degree water.
Half an hour from the parks, the spring runs at Rock Springs, Rainbow Springs and Silver Glen surface from the aquifer at a steady 72 degrees, clear enough to watch turtles and gar slide under a see-through kayak. Float the current past the cypress, swim where the water boils up cold, and keep an eye out for the manatees that drift in to warm up.
Read the guide: clear kayak and springs tours →South of the parks
Airboats, gators and manatees.
Twenty minutes past the resorts the sawgrass takes over. Flat-bottom airboats run the Kissimmee marshes past basking alligators, the gator parks put you nose to nose with the locals, and each winter the manatees crowd into the warm spring runs. The Florida that was here long before the parks.
See the wildlife trips →The capital
Four worlds of theme park, in one city.
Magic Kingdom and EPCOT, Universal’s two parks and the new Epic Universe, SeaWorld, LEGOLAND and the water parks. Nowhere else packs this many headline parks into a single trip. The trick is knowing which to book, and which days to skip the gates entirely.
Browse theme park tickets →Manatee season
Float beside a gentle giant.
Each winter, hundreds of West Indian manatees leave the cooling Gulf for the warm spring runs around Orlando. Drift over them by clear-bottom kayak at Silver Springs and Blue Spring, or join a snorkel trip out to Crystal River and slip into the water beside them. A thousand pounds of gentle sea cow, and entirely unbothered by you.
- 1 Silver Springs Clear Kayak Manatee, Monkey & Wildlife Adventures
- 2 Clear Kayak or Paddleboard Manatee Adventure
- 3 Manatee Snorkeling Adventure Tour with Lunch & Hotel Pickup
Orlando after dark
Dinner, and a show worth turning up for.
Orlando turned dinner into a sport. Knights joust on horseback over a four-course feast at Medieval Times, pirates duel above the water, magicians work the room between courses, and the whole table eats with their hands and cheers it on. Corny on paper, a genuinely good night out in practice.
See all 8 dinner shows →Beyond the parks
Six day trips from the front gate.
Kennedy Space Center for the rockets. Silver Springs for the glass-bottom boats. The Kissimmee marshes for the airboats. St. Augustine for the old town, Daytona for the beach, and the spring runs for clear-water kayaking.
By activity
Pick how to spend the day.
Airboat if you want the wild side. Helicopter if you want the skyline. Clear kayak if you want the springs. Plus dinner shows, escape rooms, manatee swims and the deep-sea charters.
Plan it
Three perfect days.
First time in Orlando? A long weekend that mixes the parks with the Florida all around them.
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