Miami Beach, more precisely the South Beach area, is one of those places with a special charm that catches visitors. Precisely, in that area are the Art Deco District, the famous Collins Avenue and the place where life passes: Ocean Drive.
The departure from Orlando to Miami was delayed because two of the crew of the rental car fell asleep. Then the luggage had to be loaded at the door of the hotel (the Rosen Centre), a task that demanded several minutes and not a few more discussions.
The first of these was about which route to take: the Turnpike or I 95. The difference between the two is not minor. The first is a private highway with toll stations, with an approximate cost of U$S 18 for the journey.
Traffic is more agile (the speed limit is 75 miles per hour, about 120 kilometers) and has service plazas every 70 kilometers (45 miles) with toilets, bars and cafes, ATMs and gas stations. If you load gas, keep in mind that in the U.S. UU the gallon is used as a measure, which is equivalent to 3.8 liters and costs about U$S 2.70 per gallon.
I95, meanwhile, is a widely used and popular highway in the southern U.S. UU, which runs through the state of Florida. While there are no toll stations, the speed limit is lower, 55/60 miles per hour (88/95 kilometers) and traffic is higher, mostly trucks.
After opting for the Turnpike and adjusting the GPS, the trip began and 3.30 hours later Miami appeared before the eyes of travelers.
What to visit? Miami. A shopping paradise.
Thanks to the wonder of technology, GPS took us directly to the Leslie Hotel, in the heart of the Art Deco District, at 1244 Ocean Drive and there was born this chronicle of one of the most emblematic sites in Florida.
In that area of South Beach, full of representative buildings of the art deco architectural current there are very rigid laws (and enviable for those who see much architectural heritage disappear): the facades of the constructions of that style, product of the masters of art deco architecture Kiehnel and Elliott, can not be altered.
It is common, then, to see how entire buildings are “emptied”, usually hotels, only the “shell” is left and inside they are rebuilt or completely renovated.
This is the case of the Leslie, built in 1937, a couple of years ago it was renovated inside and its façade valued. The same goes for its neighbor, The Carlyle, from 1939, where scenes from Bad Boy 2, with Will Smith, and Scarface, with Al Pacino and Michelle Pfeiffer, were filmed, and which is currently in the works.
A block ahead, on the corner of Ocean Drive and 13th Street, is the Hotel Cardozo, as well known as its famous owners: Emilio and Gloria Estefan.
The Nassau Suites hotel, at 1414 Collins Avenue, will also be refurbished at the end of this year, and The Shepley Hotel, located a block earlier, at 1340 Collins Ave, was recently completely renovated with an unforgettable lobby that seems to be taken from a London catalog.
These three establishments, the Leslie, the Nassau and the Shepley, are managed by Alquimia Hospitality Group, a company led by the Argentine Pablo D’Onofrio, a historical hotel industry in our country.
And, along with the hotels located on Collins Avenue, the others, built on Ocean Drive, are iconic of the art deco style.
The most famous boulevard
The title says that Ocean Drive is where Miami “lives”. Now we’ll see why. Located at the height of 4th Street in South Beach, on the first road parallel to the sea, if you look north the vision is full of reasons for amazement.
There are 11 blocks with a very unique decoration: on the right, a park of grass and palm trees limited on one side by the sidewalk and on the other, by a promenade and, immediately after, one of the most beautiful and extensive beaches in Miami.
On the other side, on the left, a succession of art deco buildings in an immense majority, richly decorated, illuminated and preserved, containing some of the most famous bars, restaurants and shops in South Beach.
It is Ocean Drive, a boardwalk-like boulevard, the pearl of South Beach and one of the most popular areas of Miami Beach.
Walking those 11 blocks, to the corner with 15th Street, is to enter a universe with the most varied human fauna imaginable.
While on one side, next to the sea, you can see sculptural and tanned bodies going or returning from the beach; men and women who walk, run, cycle or skate; homeless who ask for a cigarette and fire, of course; couples with children playing or walking them in their strollers; groups of young people whose voices and laughter prove that, who are young; some girl in an evening dress and shoes in her hand who, surely, returns from a hectic night; policemen in electric carts, and even a double column of marines, with their uniforms and backpacks, parading who knows from and to where.
If this is not diverse human fauna, then what is.
On the other side, multicolored umbrellas and palm trees provide the necessary shade for the hundreds of bars and restaurants to welcome their customers, who surely demand tropical cocktails and other drinks, all in an environment of Latin music and the other, at full volume, in a paraphernalia of voices and noises impossible to silence.
And you can imagine what that sidewalk along Ocean Drive is like at night, when the colored LED lights that adorn trees and umbrellas and those that come from inside the buildings, bathe that scenario in a breath of unreality.
Now, in what night and day are nothing more than a temporary circumstance, is in terms of the obligatory, constant and unmissable “return of the dog”.
You have to show yourself
In our towns and cities, not large cities but those smaller, inland, villages, going out to take the “turn of the dog” through the main square and surroundings, especially if the car has been changed, is part of the most acendradas customs.
Saving the distances and volume, of course, in Miami it is also styled. And where better to show yourself than in South Beach? And the best window in that part of Miami is, precisely, Ocean Drive.
They go for a walk, with an indifferent gesture, canchero, but they spy sideways to see if they are looked. They go slowly with their Mustangs, their Camaro, their Ferraris or their Lamborghini, red, yellow, black, some convertibles; also on their Harley Davidson motorcycles, without helmets and with “casual” clothes, or in Hummer trucks, with large wheels and chrome rims.
That’s “walking the dog” down Ocean Drive. And they happen once, twice and even three times. If there is a place to park, something not very common, they do it and go down to one of the bars with tables on the sidewalk to have a drink and get together with friends.
And the reader will imagine that it is American citizens, inhabitants of Miami, who make these demonstrative walks. Yes, of course, many are but not all, some of them are tourists who rent those “machines” to go out and show themselves on Ocean Drive and feel, even for a while, a couple of days, a movie character, someone with an easy and comfortable life.
Then it will be time to collide with reality and have to pay the credit card, with 35% of the Afip retention included. But, who takes away the pleasure of those moments of glory.
Source: https://www.lavoz.com.ar/turismo/ocean-drive-donde-se-vive-miami