Miami Layover: South Beach and Ocean Drive
Part of the full Miami in One Day: Biscayne Boulevard
Miami’s South Beach runs flat along the Atlantic from the Art Deco hotels of Ocean Drive, past Lummus Park’s painted lifeguard towers, down to South Pointe Park, where cruise ships pass close to shore on their way out to sea, and walking all of it costs nothing.
The Art Deco hotels along Ocean Drive
Ocean Drive faces the beach between 5th and 15th Streets in Miami Beach, and the hotels lining it are the center of the Miami Beach Architectural District, listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979: low stucco fronts in pastel paint, porthole windows, racing stripes along the parapets and neon lettering, most of it put up between the late 1920s and the early 1940s. The Colony, at 736 Ocean Drive, is the one with its name in blue neon running down a short tower; the Carlyle, at 1250, played the drag club in the 1996 film The Birdcage. The fronts are at their brightest after dark, when the neon comes on and the café tables spread across the sidewalk.
The Art Deco Welcome Center, at 1001 Ocean Drive on the corner of 10th Street, is where the Miami Design Preservation League’s own two-hour group walking tour starts, $50 for adults with headsets provided. If the group time doesn’t fit a flight, a private two-hour Art Deco walking tour leaves from the same building and can be booked ahead for a set time.
The Wolfsonian’s design collection on Washington Avenue
The Wolfsonian–FIU occupies a 1927 Mediterranean Revival warehouse at 1001 Washington Avenue, on the corner of 10th Street, built for the Washington Storage Company. The collector Mitchell Wolfson Jr. stored his collection there, ended up filling most of the building and bought it outright in the 1980s, then gave both the building and the collection to Florida International University in 1997. What’s inside is decorative art, furniture, posters and propaganda from roughly 1885 to 1945, drawn from Britain, France, Italy, Germany, the Netherlands, the Soviet Union, Japan and the United States.
Adult admission is $12, free every Friday from 6pm to 9pm. It opens 10am to 6pm Wednesday to Sunday, until 9pm on Fridays, and is closed on Mondays and Tuesdays.
Washington Avenue is also where a two-and-a-half-hour South Beach food tour starts, at 841 Washington Avenue: beef empanadas, ropa vieja with fried plantains and Cuban croquetas, with stops at the district’s buildings and film locations in between.
The painted lifeguard towers on Lummus Park beach
Lummus Park is the strip of lawn, palms and beach between Ocean Drive and the Atlantic, running the same 5th-to-15th-Street length as the hotels across the road. Its lifeguard towers are the architect William Lane’s work: Miami Beach commissioned him after Hurricane Andrew destroyed the old stands in 1992, and his first five went up on this beach in 1995, each a small cabin on stilts in its own shape and color scheme. More have been added along the shoreline since, and they’re free to walk up to and photograph from the sand.
Lummus Park’s walkway is paved, but the towers stand out on the sand itself, where a wheeled suitcase stops rolling.
Cruise ships leaving port past South Pointe Park
South Pointe Park covers the southern tip of Miami Beach, at the mouth of Government Cut, the shipping channel between the beach and Fisher Island that every cruise ship uses to leave the port downtown. Most sailings go out in the late afternoon, roughly 4pm to 6pm, passing along the park’s southern edge. The park is free and open from sunrise to sunset, with lawns, a terraced grass slope facing the water and a 450-foot fishing pier running out into the Atlantic, open from roughly 7:30am to 6pm.
For a boat trip or a half day further afield, more tours that start in Miami Beach are listed on a tours and activities platform.
An express bus from Washington Avenue to the airport
South Beach has no rail connection, so the way back is the 150 Miami Beach Airport Flyer, an express bus that stops along Washington Avenue at South Pointe Drive, 5th, 9th and 13th Streets and Lincoln Road, then crosses the Julia Tuttle Causeway to the Miami International Airport (MIA) Metrorail station. It runs every 30 minutes from about 6am until shortly before midnight, and costs a flat $2.25. The timetable gives the full run about 40 minutes; in afternoon traffic on the causeway it’s often closer to an hour. From the airport station, the free MIA Mover takes about four minutes to the terminals.
That makes leaving Washington Avenue three and a half hours before an international departure the safe call. On a shorter stop, the downtown Miami route along Biscayne Boulevard is 15 minutes from the airport by train and keeps more of the time for seeing things. Either way, collecting the bag last means the bus ride back is the only part of the day spent with it.
Frequently asked questions
What should I do during a layover near South Beach's Ocean Drive in Miami?
Walk Ocean Drive between 5th and 15th Streets for the Art Deco hotels, cross into Lummus Park for the painted lifeguard towers on the sand, and finish at South Pointe Park at the island's southern tip, where cruise ships head out to sea in the late afternoon. The Wolfsonian museum on Washington Avenue covers design and propaganda art from 1885 to 1945 and is the one stop that charges. A guided Art Deco walk or a food tour on Washington Avenue are worth booking ahead; the museum is the stop to drop if time runs short.
Is South Beach worth the trip on a short Miami layover?
Only with five hours or more to spare. The direct bus between South Beach and the airport is scheduled at around 40 minutes but often takes closer to an hour once the causeway traffic is counted, so the round trip eats close to two hours before anything else happens. With less time, the downtown Miami itinerary on Biscayne Boulevard is about 15 minutes from the airport by train and covers a bay cruise, an aquarium and the Freedom Tower instead.
What's free to do on South Beach?
Most of it. Ocean Drive's hotel fronts, the beach and lifeguard towers at Lummus Park, and South Pointe Park with its 450-foot fishing pier cost nothing. The Wolfsonian charges $12 for adults but is free every Friday from 6pm to 9pm. The guided Art Deco walking tours from 1001 Ocean Drive and the food tours on Washington Avenue are the paid extras.
When do cruise ships pass South Pointe Park?
Mostly in the late afternoon, roughly 4pm to 6pm, when the ships berthed at the port downtown sail out through Government Cut, the channel running past the park's southern edge. Weekends are busiest, with several ships often leaving one after another. The pier is open roughly 7:30am to 6pm, and the park itself from sunrise to sunset.