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We will be straight about the distance. Eagle Lake is about fifty minutes from the farm, which is the longest run of any town in eastern Polk. For a single 2-hour visit that is a fair amount of car, and we would rather say so than pretend otherwise.
What changes the arithmetic is treating us as a place with a calendar rather than a one-off. Our year has a shape to it. Easter Egg Hunts in the spring. Quiet weekday mornings through the summer, when the paddocks are empty and the oaks do the cooling. The Pumpkin Zone every day we are open through fall, with a free pumpkin on every ticket, and the Halloween Candy Hunt on 2 weekends around Halloween. Birthdays whenever they land. An annual pass covers unlimited visits for a year from the day you buy it, and across four or five trips the drive stops being the point.
The farm itself is straightforward. Cattle grazing out across the pasture, alpacas, donkeys, pigs, goats, chickens and rabbits close enough to touch and feed, a Tractor-Drawn Wagon Ride through the trees and a playground under the oaks. Single admission is $18 for anyone 2 and older, with under-2s free. Nothing is timed, nothing further is sold at the gate, and children set the pace themselves.
Green Meadows started in 1988, when Coni and Bob Keyes set it up on shaded ground in Kissimmee. For close to thirty years it was where children right across Central Florida first stood beside livestock, coming with school groups, for birthdays, or simply because a parent wanted everyone out of the house. Then it closed, and seven years went by with nothing taking its place.
The farm is open again at Lancaster Ranch Park, thanks in large part to the City of Kissimmee, and the reopening was faithful rather than reimagined. Cattle, alpacas, donkeys, pigs, goats, chickens and rabbits all stand within a child’s arm’s length. The wagon ride still carries everyone out into the pasture. The old oaks still take the edge off the heat. More ground than before, and the same idea running on it.
You will find us at Lancaster Ranch Park, 1881 Jack Calhoun Drive, Kissimmee, FL 34741, roughly thirty-eight miles and about fifty minutes northeast of Eagle Lake, usually via US-17 and US-27 or across on I-4 toward the 192 corridor. Eastern Polk has grown citrus and run cattle for well over a century, and a good deal of the drive still shows it.
Start with the day, because at this distance it matters more than anything else. We open Wednesday, Thursday and Friday from 10:00 AM until 1:00 PM, and Saturday and Sunday from 10:00 AM until 2:00 PM, closing Monday and Tuesday. The last admission is at 1:00 PM midweek and 2:00 PM Saturday and Sunday. Midweek gives you a three-hour window at the end of a fifty-minute drive, so weekends are almost always the better choice from Eagle Lake. Wednesday does carry Grandparents Day, with one grandparent admitted free alongside each paid general admission.
Bring lunch and plan to eat here. We have no cafe on the property, only vending machines, and having driven the best part of an hour it makes far more sense to spend a proper half hour at one of our shaded tables than to hurry home hungry. Bring plenty of water, sun hats, sunscreen and closed shoes, since the whole visit is spent outdoors on farm ground.
Then come over. Tickets can be booked online first or bought on arrival. Admission is $18 per person from 2 years upward, with under-2s free, and we take every major credit card and no cash whatsoever. Larger parties pay $15 each between 10 and 19 guests, or $12 each from 20 upward with a reservation, which brings a free admission for every 20 paid. Ask about the annual pass, which at this distance is the option that makes the most sense. Animal feed is an optional extra, picked up at the gate or added to your tickets online.
Plan Your Visit
Each fall the Pumpkin Zone opens and becomes the busiest stretch of our year. Worth being straight about it: this is not a pumpkin patch and we grow no pumpkins here. Every paying guest chooses one from the Zone and takes it home, free with admission, with nothing extra charged. The Zone is open every day we are open right through the season rather than on a run of weekends. The Candy Hunt happens across 2 weekends around Halloween.
Birthdays are the second. A tent is $450 and includes up to 25 guests, with additional guests at $15 each, and there are four available each day across Saturday and Sunday, tables provided. Settle the date and time, pay in full, and your tent is reserved for your celebration. Every guest gets the whole farm, so the animals, the wagon ride and the playground handle the entertaining and you organize nothing. Decorations and the catering are yours to arrange. A note for guests: pony rides and lettuce for the animals are optional extras, bought at the gate or added to your tickets online, and the celebration is outdoors from beginning to end.
Then spring, with Easter Egg Hunts, and the smaller seasonal events that turn up across the year — all posted on our Special Events page and shared first through Facebook and Instagram. School field trips and larger groups are welcome on the rates above, and from Eagle Lake a group booking often makes better sense than several families driving separately. Paying beforehand speeds entry up considerably on the day.
We are at Lancaster Ranch Park, 1881 Jack Calhoun Drive, Kissimmee, FL 34741, roughly thirty-eight miles and about fifty minutes northeast of Eagle Lake. Most families go up US-17 and US-27, or cut across on I-4 toward the 192 corridor.
It is the longest drive of any town we serve in this part of Polk County, and we would rather be honest about that than not. Come at a weekend if you can, when we stay open until 2:00 PM and the extra hour makes the journey sit better. Check your maps app before you set out, as both routes vary a good deal by hour.
For a family that expects to come back, yes, and it is the option we would point Eagle Lake families toward first. The pass covers unlimited visits for a year from the date you buy it, and once you are making three or four trips across a year the per-visit cost drops well below single admission.
It also changes how the drive feels. Instead of one long journey that has to justify itself in a single morning, you get the spring egg hunt, a quiet summer weekday, the fall Pumpkin Zone and whatever else lands in between. Single admission stays at $18 per person for anyone 2 and older, with under-2s free, if you would rather try it once first.
Not at Green Meadows. This is a petting farm and not a pumpkin patch; nothing is grown on site. Each fall the Pumpkin Zone opens, and every paying guest chooses a pumpkin from it and takes it home free with entry.
Eagle Lake is about as far from us as our towns get, so the sums matter — with a pumpkin included in the ticket rather than added at the exit, a fall visit costs what it says on the gate. The Zone is open every day we are open instead of weekends only, and the Halloween Candy Hunt runs on 2 weekends around Halloween. Dates go on our Special Events page and out first on Facebook and Instagram.
We do. Settle on a date and time, pay in advance, and your tent is reserved for your celebration. It costs $450 and covers up to 25 guests, with anyone beyond that at $15 each, and four tents run each day on Saturdays and Sundays, all with tables set out ready.
Because guests can wander the entire farm, the entertainment is settled before you plan anything at all. Between the animals, the wagon ride and the playground, it takes care of itself. The tent arrives plain, so decorations and food are entirely your choice. Do warn guests that pony rides and lettuce for the animals are optional extras, available at the gate or with your tickets online. Weekend tents are claimed early in fall.
A proper picnic, given the drive. There is no cafe here, only vending machines, and after fifty minutes on the road that is not a discovery anybody enjoys making. Shaded picnic tables are kept for exactly this, and lunch outdoors with cattle grazing behind you is a decent way to stretch the visit out. Bring plenty of water, especially in the summer months.
Otherwise dress everybody for a farm rather than a day out: closed shoes, hats and plenty of sunscreen. Mature oaks shade most of our ground so it stays cooler than you might expect, though Florida still has other ideas at times. If the weather looks uncertain before you leave Eagle Lake, call us at (407) 994-2775 first — we would far rather tell you honestly than have you drive an hour for nothing.
Most families spend between 2 and 3 hours, which at a weekend fits the opening window neatly. The first stretch usually goes on feeding the animals, then the wagon ride, then the playground, with lunch somewhere in the middle at one of the shaded tables. Nothing is timed, so you leave when your children have had enough rather than when a schedule says so.
From Eagle Lake it is worth arriving at opening to get the full run of it. The mornings are cooler, the animals are livelier and the paddocks are quieter early on. Come at 10:00 AM on a Saturday and you have four hours if you want them, which makes the drive sit far more comfortably than a rushed midweek visit would.
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