Conway, FL Outdoor Activities

Deep in eastern Seminole County, Three Crowns Farm's prime location next to next to Lake Proctor Wilderness Area affords mounted visitors direct access to miles of scenic trails. Riders can bone up on skills during a lesson in dressage, jumping, or reining, and then head out on the network of well-worn routes for a variety of trail rides. The morning ride sets out at 7 a.m., providing a pleasurable start to the day or cap to a night spent trying to empathize with horses by sleeping standing up. For night owls, the moonlight ride embarks at 7 p.m. and catches the sunset before returning at 8:30 p.m.. The farm recommends that riders wear protective clothing and shoes that cover the feet.

Each day, golf carts trundle over wooden bridges, their wheels thwacking against each plank as they cross the myriad waterways that dot Alaqua Country Club's 18-hole layout. Designed by golf legend Gary Player, the 6,662-yard course is sculpted through tunnels of 55-foot trees and incorporates water hazards that come into play on 16 holes. One shining example is the par 3 hole 13 with an island green that tests golfers' iron play and ability to use those same clubs to fight off feral caddies that use flagsticks as swords. Surrounded by the Lower Wekiva Preserve State Park, the course enchants golfers with palms draped in billowing spanish moss and occasional sightings of deer and wild turkeys.

Alaqua Country Club's new, adobe-accented clubhouse offers weekly dining specials served to tables draped in white linens, where guests can unwind after rounds or fold burgundy napkins into festive new club head covers.

In 1917, toward the end of WWI, the greens of Winter Park Country Club’s golf course echoed with baaing and bleating. In response to the wartime meat shortage, golfer cleats had given way to hooves: the course’s links, designed by John Dunn of Scotland just 17 years earlier, became grazing pastures for sheep and goats.

This was just one of many course reinventions during its more than 100 years of history, which has seen Winter Park’s fairways expand from 9 to 27 and shrink back to 9 again. Perhaps the course's greatest claim to fame has been the legendary figures who have graced its narrow, tree-hampered fairways, including players with surnames such as Hogan, Snead, and Sarazen.

Players of all stripes, from greenhorns to green-jacket holders, must deal with difficult design and terrain, as showcased on the course’s signature fourth hole, whose dogleg left and tight out-of-bounds areas lead a troubling path to a green situated behind two large bunkers and a massive oak tree. The biggest challenge, however, may reside on the par 3 seventh hole, whose deceptively simple 165-yard length leads into a hard-to-read green with a shape-shifting flagstick.

Course at a Glance:

• Nine-hole, par 35 course

• Length of 2,470 yards

• Course rating of 31.8

• Slope rating of 102 on bermuda grass

• See hole details

With a collection of Flyboards, which combine jet-ski horsepower and jetpack form, at their disposal, FlyBoard Rentals of Orlando grants momentary relief from the burden of gravity. Invented by champion jet skier Frank Zapata, the Flyboard's foot- and arm-mounted nozzles harness the turbocharged engine of a modern jet ski to propel riders up to 30 feet into the air, beneath the surface of the ocean, and directly into Justice League headquarters.

A group of escaped convicts is hiding out in an abandoned warehouse, using its labyrinth-like corridors to hide their illegal activities from the police. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to retake the warehouse while defending yourself from their volleys of multicolored paintballs. The catch? You only have 10 minutes. Orlando Paintball's intense SWAT vs. Convicts scenario has proven so realistic that Orlando’s own SWAT group regularly uses the warehouse facility for training.

That warehouse is only one of Orlando Paintball's six arenas, which include another indoor facility and four outdoor fields littered with wooden barriers, bridges, and fallen trees. These arenas constantly evolve to keep players on their toes at all times. Among the recently updated arenas is an outdoor field modeled after the Call of Duty video-game series, complete with a maze of army-camp structures and trees from which squirrels hurl paint grenades. Prepare for battle by strapping on a safety mask, renting an electronic or mechanical paintball gun, and scarfing down a free slice of pizza.