Exotic Driving
Some of the biggest thrills in Orlando are found not on roller coaster tracks, but on a racetrack. Exotic Driving Experience and the Richard Petty Driving Experience in Orlando offer high-intensity, hands on-opportunities for car buffs at Walt Disney World Speedway, an independently run track located on Disney property.
The Exotic Driving Experience lets participants take several laps around the speedway in an expensive, exotic sports car such as a Lamborghini or a Ferrari under the direction of a professional racecar driver who sits in the passenger seat. The Richard Petty product is a similar experience but uses NASCAR-style stock cars instead of street vehicles.
No matter which style of car you choose, the results are thrilling. Participants get detailed instruction before the driving begins and are allowed to push the cars’ handling, braking, acceleration and top speed as hard as they like. It’s not uncommon for drivers to hit speeds of 130 miles per hour on the track’s straightaways.
A Historic Light
Travelers typically visit Daytona Beach for its oceanfront resorts and sandy shores. But between days on the beach, the nearby Ponce de Leon Inlet Lighthouse offers visitors a look at a distinctive element of Florida history.
Built in 1887, the 175-foot red-brick lighthouse is the tallest lighthouse in Florida and one of the tallest masonry lighthouses in the country. Now a National Historic Landmark, the lighthouse and accompanying museum welcome some 140,000 visitors each year, many of which climb the 203 steps to the top of the lighthouse for a look at the authentic Fresnel lens and unparalleled views of the Daytona Beach coastline.
In addition to seeing the lighthouse, visitors can explore the museum exhibits in the historic light keeper’s home and other buildings that were part of the Ponce Inlet Light Station. Exhibits deal with lighthouse technology, history and the growth of the Daytona Beach area. Docents offer tours for groups that highlight late-19th- and early-20th-century life at the lighthouse.
Lift Off!
Anyone who loves space exploration will be thrilled by an opportunity to visit Kennedy Space Center, the tourist gateway to NASA’s Florida flight operations base. The center is the size of a small theme park, with numerous exhibit buildings and interactive rides that replicate some of the sensations that astronauts experience when blasting off or floating through space.
The Atlantis exhibit, which opened in 2013 to house the Space Shuttle Atlantis, is the crown jewel of the complex. Visitors stand just feet away from the retired shuttle, which has its bay doors open and its utility arm extended.
For real space enthusiasts, the visitor center is just the jumping-off point for a tour of NASA’s operations. Tours take groups out onto restricted territory to see the launch pads used in dozens of missions, the vehicle assembly building where rockets and shuttles are compiled, the massive “crawlers” used to transport finished space vehicles around the complex and the longest runway on Earth, where the space shuttles finished their missions.
