Miami Beach doesn't need a week. Before this trip, I sat down and built a plan for one day in South Beach, and it had way more options on it than any two people could fit into 24 hours. Then Michael and I went and picked. Below is my whole list, block by block, so you can build your own day, along with what we actually chose and the two moments that ended up on our wall.
Every stop on the list is walkable from Ocean Drive, except for a few I've marked as needing a car or a rideshare. If you're booking a place to stay, staying on or close to Washington Avenue, Collins Avenue, or Ocean Drive keeps the whole day on foot.
Our day in South Beach. Pink numbers are the stops we picked;
open circles are the other options on my list.
Want to use this map for your trip? Use the Google map below.
Tap any pin for details, or open it in Google Maps on your phone.
The day at a glance
| Time | The options | What we picked |
|---|---|---|
| 10 AM | Drop your bags, grab a Cuban coffee | Check in at Angler's Hotel |
| 11 AM to 1 PM | Walk the Art Deco strip on Ocean Drive, or a backup landmark | Ocean Drive on foot |
| 1 to 2 PM | Joe's Stone Crab takeaway, La Sandwicherie, or a packed beach lunch | Joe's takeaway counter |
| 2 to 4:30 PM | Beach or pool, no plan | Beach, gelato, rooftop pool |
| 4:30 to 6 PM | Rest up | Back to the room |
| 6 to 7:30 PM | Photos on Ocean Drive at golden hour | The Colony Hotel (lesson learned, see below) |
| 7:30 to 9:30 PM | Dinner with an ocean view, near Ocean Drive, or off the island | Toni's Sushi Bar |
| 9:30 to 11:30 PM | South Pointe Pier, a rooftop bar, or call it a night | The pier, then Ocean Drive after dark |
| Next morning | Sunrise on the beach, then breakfast | The beach, then Puerto Sagua |
Saturday
10 AM: Drop your bags
The options: My shortlist of places to stay had The Tony Hotel, the Avalon, the Century, and Angler's Hotel, all within a few blocks of Ocean Drive. I also left the first hour open on purpose. A Cuban coffee was the only thing on the list.
What we picked: Angler's. Our day started at 3:30 AM, when we left Fort Worth for an early flight, so we were more than ready for the welcome we got: friendly staff, a glass of wine for our red eyes (they were very red), and a room that was already made up even though we were hours ahead of check-in. Bags up, a quick freshen-up, and we were back out on the street in under an hour.
Checked in at Angler's, a little bleary-eyed.
11 AM to 1 PM: Walk the Art Deco strip
The options: Ocean Drive's Art Deco hotels were the main event, with the Colony, the Breakwater, and Park Central on my list. As backups, in case the timing or the weather didn't cooperate, I had the outside of The Bass museum, the Wynwood Walls murals, and the gardens at Vizcaya. Wynwood and Vizcaya are off the island and need a car or a rideshare.
What we picked: Ocean Drive, on foot. We treated it as a scouting walk, with no real agenda, just slow laps past the pastel facades and the palms leaning over the sidewalk. One of the first things we saw, parked at the curb outside The Fritz with its yellow umbrellas, was a mint-green vintage Buick, sun-faded and a little rusted at the edges in the best possible way. We hadn't even gotten our bearings yet! That car is the reason Ocean Drive by Day exists. We weren't looking for a print when we saw it. We were just looking.
The Fritz, and the car that started a print. |
The Buick, up close. |
From there we kept wandering. We found a plaza just off the beach paved in wide rainbow stripes of painted brick, and I couldn't resist kicking off my shoes and twirling across it. The walk toward lunch took us down a completely different Miami Beach: a shaded sidewalk lined with banana leaves and oak trees, quiet and green, just a few blocks from Ocean Drive's neon and chrome.
The rainbow plaza. Shoes optional. |
A few blocks over, a much greener Miami Beach. |
1 to 2 PM: Lunch
The options: The takeaway counter at Joe's Stone Crab, La Sandwicherie for French sandwiches to carry to the beach, or a packed lunch on the sand.
What we picked: Joe's takeaway counter. We split a stone crab salad roll, served with chips and a lime wedge, and found a bench to eat it on. The counter gets you Joe's without a sit-down meal.
Lunch from the Joe's takeaway counter.
2 to 4:30 PM: Do nothing on purpose
The options: The beach, or the hotel pool. I left this block unscheduled on purpose.
What we picked: Both. (Tough assignment, I know.) We walked the beach for a while with no plan beyond feeling the sand, and stopped for gelato at a shop with a flower wall made for photos like this one. Then it was back to Angler's and up to La Terraza, the rooftop pool, with a bit of bird imagery in the mural on the pool deck wall. If you're only in a city for a day, it still needs a few hours where you're not doing anything at all.
Gelato in front of the flower wall. |
La Terraza, the rooftop pool at Angler's. |
4:30 to 6 PM: Rest up
Back to the room, out of the sun, ready for the evening.
6 to 7:30 PM: Photos on Ocean Drive (and what we learned)
The plan: Golden hour at the Colony Hotel, with its vertical neon sign and the Boulevard Hotel next door.
What we learned: We went, and we took the photos. But the hotels on Ocean Drive face the ocean, so the sun sets behind them. At golden hour the facades sit in their own shadow. Next time we'd go in the morning right after sunrise, when the sun comes up over the water and lands on the front of the buildings. Or go after dark, once the neon is on. That's the version we came back for later that night.
Ocean Drive in the afternoon. By golden hour, these fronts are in shade.
7:30 to 9:30 PM: Dinner
The options: I sorted my list three ways.
- With an ocean view: Smith & Wollensky at South Pointe, Ocean Grill at The Setai, or Nikki Beach (better for an earlier meal).
- Near Ocean Drive: Joe's Stone Crab for dinner, Toni's Sushi Bar, or Casa Tua.
- Worth a car or a rideshare: Versailles in Little Havana, Macchialina, Lucali, or Mila.
What we picked: Toni's Sushi Bar, about a ten-minute walk from Ocean Drive. It's worth the walk on looks alone: a curved ceiling of bent bamboo slats overhead, low pendant lights, and a sushi chef working the counter right in front of you. We kept it simple with a plate of nigiri, a couple of rolls, and a cold beer to close out the day.
The bamboo ceiling at Toni's. |
Nigiri, rolls, and a cold beer. |
9:30 to 11:30 PM: After dark
The options: The pier at South Pointe Park, a rooftop bar, or an early night.
What we picked: The pier, then Ocean Drive one more time. For us the pier was a 30 to 45 minute walk each way from Ocean Drive. It's quieter than the strip, lined with glowing red light columns, with the Miami skyline lit up across the water and cargo ships out past the jetty.
South Pointe Pier after dark.
On the walk back we swung through Ocean Drive again, this time with the sky fully dark. That second pass, past the Colony Hotel lit up in blue neon with classic cars still parked at the curb, is where Ocean Drive at Night came from.
The Colony after dark. This is the one that became a print.
By then the strip was just hitting its stride, with bigger crowds, louder music, and tables filling back in. It looked like fun, but between a 3:30 AM start and a full day on our feet, we were done. A short stopover means picking your moments, and for us, sleep won.
Sunday morning
The options: A sunrise walk on the beach, a last Cuban coffee, then breakfast. On my breakfast list: News Cafe and Front Porch Cafe on Ocean Drive, La Sandwicherie for something to go, and Puerto Sagua on Collins Avenue.
What we picked: The beach first, with no plan and no photos to chase, just sand and waves for a while. Angler's held our bags after checkout, so from there we walked over to Puerto Sagua, a Cuban diner on Collins Avenue. Michael had the Cuban sandwich, I had the picadillo, and the coffee was Café Bustelo, which has its own small tie to our family. (My father grew up next to Bustelo's very first roasting storefront on 5th Avenue in New York City, but that's a story for another post.) Brunch, then straight to the airport. Our 24 hours had stretched to a little over a day, and it was exactly enough.
Sunday morning on the sand. |
Brunch at Puerto Sagua. |
Two prints, one day
We build the Hand-Illustrated Stopovers series around trips like this one: real places at a specific hour. Every Stopover print leaves the crowds out, so the only travelers in the scene are us, the birds. Miami Beach gave Michael two prints to draw. Ocean Drive by Day shows the Buick at the curb outside The Fritz. Ocean Drive at Night shows the Colony Hotel's neon after full dark, from our second pass down Ocean Drive.
Both are hand-illustrated by Michael and printed as genuine giclées on Crane's Lettra cotton paper. They come in 8x10 ($25) and 11x14 ($33), ship unframed, and fit standard frames, including our oak and metal picture frames.
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Look closely at both and you'll find us in there. Only two of us made this trip, so only two of the series' four birds appear in these scenes: the barn swallow and the crane.
