My family made the drive over to Mt. Dora this weekend to visit Long & Scott Farms, as we had heard it was the first day of their now 18th Annual Corn Maze and Pumpkin Patch. We purchased our tickets online in advance in order to ensure our admission. When purchasing tickets, you then have a 15-minute entrance option, and have visibility to the number of remaining tickets that exist for that time selection. We opted for the 10:15am entrance time, for which there were still more than 70 tickets available.
Upon arriving to the property, there were traffic attendants directing us to where we could park in their lot. We walked up to the ticket booth, showed them my ticket purchase confirmation from my cell phone, and we then received our wristbands. We were warmly welcomed by another attendant of the family-owned property who pointed us in the direction of the corn maze.
We thought that this was going to be a relatively quick visit: go through the maze with some friends, then leave. But we were wrong. There was ALOT of family activities to be done on this farm, and we were in for a real treat!
The corn maze itself is a series of paths, lined by color-coded caution tape. You are walking over basically dirt and grass paths, so bring some shoes that you're not nervous about getting a little dusty. You're issued tall flags for your group to carry, so that you can be tracked and watched by the farm's staff who were perched atop a raised central observation platform, ready to offer up directional guidance and support for all the visitors (there is a point during your journey through the maze where you actually will walk up and over this platform, and can get a really great bird's eye view of the maze through which you're touring).
You're not permitted to touch the corn, so hopefully this maze will be able to maintain its beauty through the entirety of the season. It was a very well-kept field when we passed through. Our group was moving non-stop, and we were able to get through the maze in just about 25 minutes.
There's an exit sign at the end of the maze. If you haven't been taking photos up to this point, I'd recommend you taking a photo here at least to commemorate your navigational accomplishment!
At the exit of the maze, you'll see some really wonderful photo ops with oversized chairs (1 chair was able to accommodate my family of 4 for our photo), a 'shot me the ropes' rope course version for little ones to test our their maze-navigating skills, a 'confusion tree maze' which is a much smaller maze option for families, the 'Sweet Corn Express' (tractor-pulled hayride to provide guided tours of the farm), a Kona Ice truck, and Tom & Cathy's (outdoor food-serving area). 'The Kettle Corn Cabin' food tent served that ABSOLUTE BEST KETTLE CORN WE'VE EVER TASTED (our tall bag of sweet-and-salty popcorn didn't survive the trip back to Orlando... our hungry family devoured this tasty yumminess). There's a small tunnel that can be explored, a large cactus trees to photograph, and then a very cute pumpkin patch display (the pumpkins weren't massive, but they looked so much prettier than what you would normally find at the neighborhood grocery store).
There's a produce market area onsite ($.80 per ear of sweet corn, but this did seem like some high quality corn worth the price), there's a general store in which you can purchase some jellies and other sauces, and in the very back of this market complex there's another food-buying Market and Cafe option (we saw some people ordering lunch from here).
Also on property is a small pond (for $2 you can rent a bamboo fishing pool, hooked with some bread, while you try and catch some fish), an oversized tire playground, a large inflatable 'bounce house' (without the house, just the floor to bounce on), a very large outdoor playground set, a stone maze area, and some photo ops with some of the special tractors of the farm.
In all we spent just about 2 hours here, and it made for some good old-fashioned bonding time with family and friends. There was very decent number of visitors, but because the farm was so expansive, we were extremely well spread out for social-distancing purposes. I think we would have stayed longer if our friends didn't have other engagements in Orlando, and if didn't need to run some errands for our girls, because this farm provided for some really fun and memorable family time.
If you're thinking of visiting, order your tickets online in advance to ensure that you don't get turned away. Bring some spending money and pick up some great tasting souvenirs. Lastly, make sure you allocate at least 2 hours to be here, you won't be disappointed if you do. Oh, and you have until December 13 to visit the Corn Maze this year, so you've got some time to make plans!
Bailey Guinigundo
Upon arriving to the property, there were traffic attendants directing us to where we could park in their lot. We walked up to the ticket booth, showed them my ticket purchase confirmation from my cell phone, and we then received our wristbands. We were warmly welcomed by another attendant of the family-owned property who pointed us in the direction of the corn maze.
We thought that this was going to be a relatively quick visit: go through the maze with some friends, then leave. But we were wrong. There was ALOT of family activities to be done on this farm, and we were in for a real treat!
The corn maze itself is a series of paths, lined by color-coded caution tape. You are walking over basically dirt and grass paths, so bring some shoes that you're not nervous about getting a little dusty. You're issued tall flags for your group to carry, so that you can be tracked and watched by the farm's staff who were perched atop a raised central observation platform, ready to offer up directional guidance and support for all the visitors (there is a point during your journey through the maze where you actually will walk up and over this platform, and can get a really great bird's eye view of the maze through which you're touring).
You're not permitted to touch the corn, so hopefully this maze will be able to maintain its beauty through the entirety of the season. It was a very well-kept field when we passed through. Our group was moving non-stop, and we were able to get through the maze in just about 25 minutes.
There's an exit sign at the end of the maze. If you haven't been taking photos up to this point, I'd recommend you taking a photo here at least to commemorate your navigational accomplishment!
At the exit of the maze, you'll see some really wonderful photo ops with oversized chairs (1 chair was able to accommodate my family of 4 for our photo), a 'shot me the ropes' rope course version for little ones to test our their maze-navigating skills, a 'confusion tree maze' which is a much smaller maze option for families, the 'Sweet Corn Express' (tractor-pulled hayride to provide guided tours of the farm), a Kona Ice truck, and Tom & Cathy's (outdoor food-serving area). 'The Kettle Corn Cabin' food tent served that ABSOLUTE BEST KETTLE CORN WE'VE EVER TASTED (our tall bag of sweet-and-salty popcorn didn't survive the trip back to Orlando... our hungry family devoured this tasty yumminess). There's a small tunnel that can be explored, a large cactus trees to photograph, and then a very cute pumpkin patch display (the pumpkins weren't massive, but they looked so much prettier than what you would normally find at the neighborhood grocery store).
There's a produce market area onsite ($.80 per ear of sweet corn, but this did seem like some high quality corn worth the price), there's a general store in which you can purchase some jellies and other sauces, and in the very back of this market complex there's another food-buying Market and Cafe option (we saw some people ordering lunch from here).
Also on property is a small pond (for $2 you can rent a bamboo fishing pool, hooked with some bread, while you try and catch some fish), an oversized tire playground, a large inflatable 'bounce house' (without the house, just the floor to bounce on), a very large outdoor playground set, a stone maze area, and some photo ops with some of the special tractors of the farm.
In all we spent just about 2 hours here, and it made for some good old-fashioned bonding time with family and friends. There was very decent number of visitors, but because the farm was so expansive, we were extremely well spread out for social-distancing purposes. I think we would have stayed longer if our friends didn't have other engagements in Orlando, and if didn't need to run some errands for our girls, because this farm provided for some really fun and memorable family time.
If you're thinking of visiting, order your tickets online in advance to ensure that you don't get turned away. Bring some spending money and pick up some great tasting souvenirs. Lastly, make sure you allocate at least 2 hours to be here, you won't be disappointed if you do. Oh, and you have until December 13 to visit the Corn Maze this year, so you've got some time to make plans!
Bailey Guinigundo