Paddling the Chain: From Perkins Ramp to Lake Gatlin
An 8.9-mile documented paddle threads Lake Conway, Little Lake Conway and the canals to quiet Lake Gatlin. The paddler's guide to Belle Isle's chain, launches included.
3 minute read
The Conway Chain was made by glaciers and geology, protected by incorporation, and is mostly experienced by motorboat. Paddlers get the slower, better version. From a kayak, the chain reads as what it actually is — four interconnected portions of Lake Conway, Little Lake Conway and Lake Gatlin, joined by canals, covering more than 1,800 acres of clear water — and Belle Isle holds the best launch on it. This is the paddler’s guide to the chain.
The documented route: Perkins Ramp and back
The reference paddle for the chain is the Conway Chain of Lakes paddle information sheet published for Florida day-paddle routes: an intermediate-level trip of 8.9 miles, estimated at about four hours, launching from Perkins Ramp in Belle Isle. The sheet describes water that is typically clear and green over a hard, sandy bottom, with clarity that can exceed 25 feet on good-weather days, and shorelines that — while mostly developed — still hold bald cypress and plenty of shorebirds to observe. Beds of peppergrass, eelgrass and hydrilla scattered offshore make the same water a popular fishing chain, so expect company from anglers.
Intermediate is the honest grade. These are large lakes: fairly shallow on average, but open enough to get genuinely choppy on windy days, and shared with jet skis, wake boarders, water skiers and fishing boats — the paddle sheet calls out weekend traffic specifically. Pick a calm morning, wear a PFD, leave a float plan, and treat the open crossings with the respect you would give any big water.
Lake Gatlin: the quiet end of the chain
The western prize of the route is Lake Gatlin, the chain’s small pool — about 68 acres — reached by canals from Little Lake Conway. Where Lake Conway proper is the chain’s social, ski-boat center, Gatlin is its quiet room: a compact lake at the end of a canal run, the natural turnaround point for paddlers and the place the whole system exhales. The approach passes one of the chain’s deep sections, with depths reaching around 30 feet near the cut up into Gatlin — deep, clear water that feels more like a spring run than a city lake.
Shorter options
Not every paddle needs to be nine miles. Warren Park, Belle Isle’s largest park, has a canoe launch on the Lake Conway shore — the put-in for an hour’s shoreline paddle among the docks and cypress rather than a full chain traverse. Perkins also works as an out-and-back launch for Little Lake Conway alone: go as far as the canals tempt you, and turn around when the wind or the clock says so. Ramp rules, including Perkins’ resident-decal parking and sunrise-to-sunset hours, are laid out in our boat ramp guide.
Why this chain, for paddlers
A word on conditions, because the paddle sheet is candid about them: wind is the chain’s governing variable. The same openness that makes Lake Conway good ski water can turn a return crossing into a headwind workout by afternoon, which is why experienced chain paddlers launch early, hug the shorelines on the exposed basins and save the canal network — sheltered, shaded and current-free — for the windy hours. Afternoon thunderstorms in the summer months deserve the same respect: plan to be off the open water well before they build.
Most urban paddling in Florida is a compromise — a canal, a river reach, a lake ringed by a highway. The Conway Chain is a full lake system inside a city that exists to protect it, three miles from an international airport and utterly quiet at dawn. Launch from Belle Isle, thread the canals, end at Lake Gatlin, and you have paddled the entire argument for the city’s existence. The Lake Conway profile explains how the lakes fit together, and the Orlando Top Spots Map shows where the chain sits in the region.
Photo: Chris Gent, CC BY-SA, via Flickr — across Lake Conway toward the Belle Isle shoreline.
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