Things to Do in South Beach, Miami Beach

The Art Deco district

South Beach, the southern tip of Miami Beach, is built around its Art Deco district: hundreds of pastel hotels and apartment buildings from the 1920s to the 1940s along Ocean Drive, Collins Avenue and Washington Avenue, with racing stripes, porthole windows and neon. A guided walking tour, starting near the Art Deco Welcome Center on Ocean Drive, explains how the style grew and how the district was saved from demolition in the 1970s and 80s.

Evening tours show the neon lit up, and some tours run in French or by bike; the Wolfsonian museum adds the decorative arts of the period.

Beyond Ocean Drive

Lincoln Road is the pedestrian street for shopping and cafés, and Española Way, with its Mediterranean revival arches, is lined with restaurants. The beach itself is wide and free, with the famous colourful lifeguard towers; South Pointe Park at the tip watches the cruise ships leave Government Cut.

Several city tours combine South Beach with Wynwood and Little Havana in half a day, and some sailing trips leave from South Beach marinas.

Tips

Walk in the morning or late afternoon to avoid the midday heat, and go back to Ocean Drive after dark for the neon. Parking is expensive — rideshare or the free Miami Beach trolley are easier.