Florida’s Hidden Gems: Dezerland Park & Showcase of Citrus – Exploring Beyond the Main Parks

Last updated on September 16th, 2023 at 08:41 pm

Hi all, today we thought we would Blog about some of our experiences away from the Main parks of Orlando. This Blog series will span over a number of posts and will have one or two attractions in each article. A member of our Patreon community came up with the name “Beyond the parks” which we loved. Hope you enjoy the article.

We have been visiting Florida for over twenty years now. Over these years we have hit the main parks hard, sometimes from morning until night, riding as many rides as we could, rope dropping, and staying until the fireworks show late in the evening.

Many times we have come away from a park with aching feet vowing never to return (this is probably a familiar story to anyone spending a full day in a park, especially the always busy Magic Kingdom)

As we have been lucky enough to return to Florida a number of times, eventually purchasing an annual pass (which includes parking at all parks so we don’t feel like we need to spend a whole day in a park to get worth out of the charges) we have discovered our favourite way to enjoy our time there is to have some downtime away from the main parks. We enjoy nipping in a park for a few hours, hopping on a few of our favourite rides, sampling some good food, having a mooch down main street enjoying the ambiance then leaving to explore outside the parks (not forgetting the all-important nanna nap which we try to squeeze in when required)

Ever since our first trip to Florida, we have made use of hire cars and headed to beaches and other surrounding sites. Florida has a huge amount to offer than just the main Disney and Universal parks its a shame not to explore some of them while you are in the area. Obviously, it’s a little harder if you don’t drive in Florida but you could always try an Uber. We have always found Ubers to be excellent ways of getting around, efficient, and usually not too expensive.

You could easily go to Florida, enjoy the sun and the sites without ever stepping foot into Disney / Universal and you would more than likely save a small fortune

Over the years we have visited and vlogged a number of places which we thought we would share with you in this blog series. These will help if you need some time outside the park bubbles

Dezerland Park Orlando

We will start with Dezerland as it’s a great place to take the whole family whether you have children or not

Dezerland is located at the top of International Drive. It is an enclosed amusement park and shopping mall which is ideal for any rainy day as all attractions are undercover. If you are a long-time visitor to the area you may remember the location being Belz shopping outlet, it was rebranded and opened as Dezerland park in 2021.

It has 800,000 square feet of indoor attractions, including a James Bond museum, Automobile Museum, Karting, Ten pin bowling, Axe throwing, a trampoline park, and many eating places

Dezerland is free to enter and walk around, you pay for the entertainment you want to participate in (pricing can be found here on their website, check out Groupon for offers before you go)

Here is the current full list of attractions as of July 2022:

Karting
The Auto Experience
Bowling
The Pinball Place
Trampoline Park
Arcade / Amusements
Thunder Foam Arena
Bumper Cars
4D Motion Simulators
Axe Throwing
Glow in the Dark Golf
Play Shooting
Smash n Dash (literally go in a room and smash and break things with a baseball bat, a great release of any built-up frustration)
Cinema
James Bond Museum
Take a look on the Dezerland website to keep up to date with all the latest attractions

One of the attractions we tried on a recent trip was “The Putting Edge”, an indoor glow-in-the-dark crazy golf course (where Leigh got another one of his hole-in-ones) You can watch our time there below

You can see reviews of Dezerland on Trip Advisor here

Showcase of Citrus

Next on our list is Showcase of Citrus. A 2500-acre family-owned estate with over 50 varieties of Citrus. They offer a variety of experiences for all the family including picking your own oranges (which we loved), monster truck tours, and gem mining.

We had never really paid much attention to this place until we asked for suggestions on our Florida Facebook group for things to do. (we have a fantastic community of Florida-loving people on there. Check it out if you’re on Facebook and come and say hello)

As always, check the coupon books you can find in supermarkets and on stands in shops to see if they have deals for Showcase of Citrus. You can also check their website for current offers.

We started our day with a Creamsicle which is a slushy drink layered with Frozen yogurt. It melted quickly in the Florida heat but was so refreshing and the small size was perfect and reasonably priced at $5.50 plus tax. Just eat it quickly before you end up with a messy puddle on the table.

We had a little mooch around the old country store which sells goods from Jams, food, and gifts. Next, we tried a giant cookie from Yiayia’s Bakery (inside the old country store)

Going into the store and looking around is free, you decide if you want to pay for anything extra. We paid for the Monster truck tour which cost us $25 each.

The daily tour schedule for the tour is:

10am, 11am, 12pm, 1pm, 3pm, 4pm, 5pm, and 6pm (5 and 6pm tours are only available during summer daylight savings time)

We really enjoyed the tour. You get to see plenty of wildlife including watusi, water buffalo, alligators, and snakes, and a highlight was feeding the two Zebras (everyone gets a handful of animal food included with the tour price). The tour lasts approximately an hour. Tour is fully wheelchair accessible. Kids will love this tour.

The main reason we wanted to visit was to pick our own oranges. Again you pay for this separately. $5 per person plus $10 for an empty bag to fill with your own oranges, grapefruit, lemons, limes, and other citrus fruit. We filled the bag and squeezed some very tasty fresh orange juice when we returned to the Villa

The full list of activities can be found here

You can see reviews of Showcase of Citrus on Trip Advisor here

You can watch our time at Showcase of Citrus on the vlog below

Leave us a message in the comments section letting us know if you have been to these places and any other suggestions of places to visit outside the parks