What's Actually Open at Eastport This Summer, and What's Still on the Drawing Board

If you drove past Central Lake a year ago, you were looking at fenced-off dirt and a stage frame. Drive past this July and there's a hotel with a working restaurant, a steakhouse taking dinner reservations, an executive golf course tallying scores, and a pedestrian bridge carrying couples out to a waterfront park at sunset. The shift has been quick enough that even neighbors two miles away are catching up.

That speed is also the trap. Eastport is being built in phases, and half of what shows up in press releases and video walkthroughs is still months from a soft opening. If you're planning a Saturday around it, or hosting family in town next month, the useful question isn't what Eastport will be. It's what it is right now, in July 2026, versus what's still a construction fence with a signed lease behind it.

The line between rendering and reality

Here is the cleanest way to sort it, based on confirmed status as of last month:

The list on the left is a real evening out. The list on the right is a good reason to keep your Vmail subscription active.

What the waterfront actually gives you today

Central Lake is the piece that most changes daily life for anyone already living nearby. The Eastport area covers 250 acres of recreation, golf, trails, parks, and dining connected through pathways surrounding a 1000-meter body of water called Central Lake. That scale is easy to miss in photos. It's roughly the walking loop of a small European lakefront, which is exactly what the designers were after.

At Sunset Island, a pedestrian bridge carries you onto a small island park with picnic space, a walking wharf, and a shoreline view of the town center and Hotel Eastport across the water. It reads best in the last hour before dusk, which is when regulars have started showing up. Bring a chair if you plan to stay through a set on the waterfront stage.

Golfers got their piece late last year. Bellaire Executive Golf Course began welcoming golfers on Wednesday, November 5. The driving range, the Golf Academy, and the new Golf Shop and Custom Club Shop are all open alongside it, which means Eastport is the rare Villages district where you can practice, get fitted, and play a round without leaving the neighborhood.

Olympia is doing more than the brochure suggests

Olympia Recreation is the anchor Villagers have been waiting on, and it's the one place where "opened" needs a footnote. Phase 1 outdoor came online last August, and the indoor grand opening followed this spring. The indoor lineup includes programmed play at The Athletic Club, arts and crafts studios, gathering rooms, The Fit Club, and a preview of The Summit Rock Climbing Wall; just outside along Central Lake at the wharf sit The Boathouse, walks on Nadine Trail, and outdoor fitness and fun at Sunset Island.

A few pieces of programming that don't show up in the glossy materials but are already on the schedule: cardio drumming classes are now taking place at the Olympia complex, adding regularly scheduled group fitness to Eastport's recreation offerings. Island Fin Poké is the official concession at the Farragut Softball Complex, which turns a softball game into a plausible lunch plan. Sophie Doodles Canine Park is open for the four-legged half of the household.

If you have out-of-town grandkids visiting this summer, The Summit rock wall and the indoor gymnasium are the two draws that consistently sell them on the trip.

Dining you can book tonight

Four places are actually serving food inside Eastport as of this writing.

Prime + Ember is the headliner. The signature steakhouse is open in the heart of the town center, taking reservations for dining overlooking the stage. The address is 7030 Central Lake Dr., The Villages, FL 33585. The menu leans on prime cuts like the Kansas City Strip and the Delmonico Prime, with enhancements including a Cabernet Demi or a Classic Béarnaise. It's the room to book when you want the evening to feel like an occasion.

Yamas sits inside Hotel Eastport. The Eastport Hotel opened January 9, 2026, with a Mediterranean-style restaurant and an ice-cream shop overlooking the lake and resort pool. It's the closest thing Eastport has to a hotel-lobby dining scene, which is useful when you have guests staying on site.

Port Side Coffee Co. is a smaller find. It operates inside the Eastport sales office building, which sounds odd until you realize it turns a model-home visit into a legitimate coffee stop.

Island Fin Poké is the softball-side option mentioned above. If you're watching a game at Farragut, that's your lunch.

That's the full serving list this month. If someone tells you Lucky Goat is pouring or Peach Valley is flipping eggs at Eastport, they're describing a lease, not a menu.

The quirk locals have already noticed

Eastport's entertainment schedule doesn't behave like Spanish Springs or Lake Sumter Landing, and this catches new visitors off guard. Villages Entertainment has indicated it is intentionally starting with a broader mix of lower-intensity formats including solo performers, DJs, game nights, and movies while evaluating what works best for this location, and event scheduling is already occurring multiple nights per week, though the format and scale differ from those at older Villages town squares.

There is one practical detail worth planning around. Unlike older Villages town squares, seating is not consistently provided for live entertainment at Eastport at this time, so visitors attending music or events should plan to bring their own chairs. Homeowners near the square have also observed that sound and stage lighting from the Eastport square are noticeable from nearby residential areas, with music audible during scheduled events and stage lighting visible at night from the closest homes. Whether that reads as charm or as something to plan around depends on where your lanai faces. It's the kind of detail worth walking at 8 p.m. on a Friday before making any decisions about a home two streets from the stage.

What's next, on a real timeline

The interesting run of openings comes in the back half of this year. Oak & Stone, the craft beer and artisan pizza tavern, and Maseritas Tacos & Tequila Cantina are both slated for third-quarter 2026. Maseritas will occupy roughly 4,700 square feet on Central Lake Drive, from the same operator running Tex-Mex spots in Naples and Estero. China Taste is confirmed for fourth quarter. Peach Valley Café, Lucky Goat Coffee, Sundaze Ice Cream Shoppe, and Mia Sorella Boutique are all confirmed leases without firm dates yet.

The larger unknown is grocery. Developers have set aside a pad near the Eastport recreation complex for a future grocery store, but no tenant has been named. For now, the grocery run still means Publix at another plaza.

If you want to sanity-check any of this before making a plan, the developer's own Eastport page keeps a running calendar of what's happening this month, and the Eastport Timeline tracks each opening as it lands.

The takeaway for people already here

Eastport in July 2026 is a functioning town center for the first time. Not a full one, but a real one. You can book a steakhouse dinner, walk the wharf, play a round at Bellaire, climb a wall at Olympia, and end at a hotel bar without leaving Central Lake. That was not true six months ago. It will be more true six months from now, when Oak & Stone and Maseritas open and the Q4 additions land. For anyone who already lives in or next to Eastport, the value of tracking it in phases is that you get the good tables and the good tee times before the district finishes filling in.

If you're thinking about a move that puts you closer to Central Lake, or you already own here and want to understand what these openings are doing to values in the streets nearest the square, Martha Ridgway is happy to walk the neighborhood with you and answer the questions that don't fit inside a listing description. Request Your Free Home Valuation to start the conversation.