United States · Florida · Orlando
Holden Heights, Orlando — Area Guide & Where to Stay
Lake Holden fills the middle of Holden Heights, an unincorporated census place in Orange County, Florida, just south of downtown Orlando.
About Holden Heights
Where to stay in Holden Heights
Where you base yourself shapes the visit — here's the character of each area.
Holden Heights keeps its lodging on South Orange Blossom Trail, the highway strip that closes the western edge. The rest is houses and water. Streets east of the strip fall away toward Lake Holden and stay residential right to the water, so a bed here means a car, a short run north into Orlando, and quiet once the traffic thins.
You want this base for the drive rather than the walk. Cypress Grove Park holds the open ground at the southern end.
About Holden Heights
What are the main landmarks in Holden Heights?
Holden Heights gives its southern arm over to Cypress Grove Park, ninety acres of Orange County parkland on Holden Avenue. A 1925 estate house stands on the grounds, kept for weddings and meetings, and the lawns run down to Lake Jessamine, most of which lies south of the district line. Lake Holden takes the middle.
Along the western edge, South Orange Blossom Trail carries the shopfronts and the through traffic.
What is the history of Holden Heights?
Holden Heights holds the ground where Orange County's first permanent European settlers put down their claim. Isaac and Aaron Jernigan, cattlemen out of Georgia, took land at the west end of Lake Holden in July 1843 under the Armed Occupation Act, two miles from the army post at Fort Gatlin. Their homestead became the nucleus of a village called Jernigan, which had a post office by 1850 and gave up the name to Orlando in 1857.
An Orlando boundary act of 1911 pulled most of the Holden Heights name inside the city, and later annexations took more. What is left is unincorporated Orange County.
Where is Holden Heights?
Holden Heights runs south from Michigan Street to Cypress Grove Park, with South Orange Blossom Trail closing the western edge and Holden Avenue crossing the middle.
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Updated September 2026