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Outdoors, indoors. Right out your door, right down the road. Adventures are endless at Sun ‘n Lake.
Streams, lakes, rolling hills, and orange groves make Sebring 80 percent natural area. You can be as relaxed (a picnic) or as active (a hike, bike ride, or air-boat tour) as your heart desires. “Heartland,” in fact, is the name for our special part of Florida.
Our charming towns pair their natural delights with history, art, and sports (even sports history, like the oldest road-racing course in North America). You’ll find much to entertain and challenge your mind.
And because our south-central location is the heart of the peninsula, exciting destinations like Orlando, Tampa, and Miami are easy drives.
So choose home ‘n cozy, home ‘n golfing, out ‘n about . . . every choice is excellent at Sun ‘n Lake.
Right at Home
Sebring and its sister cities in Highlands County—Avon Park and Lake Placid— are a refreshing natural and cultural oasis in central Florida. Multiple parks, nature tourism, festivals, museums, boutique shopping, crafts, sophisticated or down-home dining: everything you could want . . . in a place you want to call home. (Explore the area’s unlimited opportunities at www.highlandscvb.com.)
Local Links
The Convention and Visitors Bureau
www.highlandscvb.com
Sebring International Raceway
www.sebringraceway.com
Highlands Hammock State Park
www.floridastateparks.org/highlandshammock
Children’s Museum of the Highlands
www.childrensmuseumhighlands.com
Sebring itself is designated a 1920s Historic District on the National Register of Historic Places. Founded beside Lake Jackson in 1911 by George Sebring, it’s called “The City on the Circle” for Mr. Sebring’s unique plan of running all roads into the center of the community. Circle Park and Circle Drive are still focal points for events, festivals, and shopping—in fact, better than ever. Named a Florida Main Street Community in 1996, Sebring has reinvested over $16 million in its downtown. Walkers and cyclists circle Lake Jackson on a lovely 12-mile trail.
Sebring’s colorful history calls up 1920s Northern tycoons, cattle ranches and citrus groves, the Seaboard Railroad’s Orange Blossom Special, the Biltmore-backed luxury resort of Harder Hall (soon to be renovated), a CCC-built park (Highlands Hammock State Park), the Hendricks Field WWII bomber base, and “12 Hours of Sebring,” the oldest road race of its kind in North America, still known around the world. The Sebring International Speedway draws some 100,000 people to its major races.
Beauty and vitality kept Sebring alive through Florida’s boom-and-bust cycles of the last century. Today it flourishes as never before. The Cultural Center is an axis of public library, Sebring Historical Society, Highlands Art League and Museum, and regionally known Highlands Little Theater. Downtown is a browser’s dream. And outdoor magnets include six parks, three public beaches, an historic pier, and a boat ramp. (Find out more at www.greatersebringchamberofcommerce.org.)