Local Sightseeing

South Beach (www.visitsouthbeachonline.com)
701 Brickell Avenue, Suite 2700
Miami, Florida 33131
Phone: 305-539-3063

South Beach is unique place in America: an eclectic mix of local Latin flavor, touristy spots, hip style, and a sun, sand, and surf culture. It's both laid back and New York glamour at the same time, which is what makes Miami great. From shopping to partying, this area of Miami Beach is well-known for being a trendy locale.

South Beach has an active club and bar scene. It is host to more than 150 clubs and other venues, most of which close at 5 am. Nightlife in South Beach is dynamic and ever-changing, although The Clevelander and Mac's Club Deuce have remained steadfast tourist destinations on Ocean Drive for well over a decade.

South Beach is one of the world's foremost locations for fashion shoots, making the Miami area the model shoot capital of the United States. Approximately 1500 models live in the area, with many more arriving during the prime fashion shooting season, October to March. Ocean Drive is the most popular place for shoots, but back streets are often used as well.

Miami Seaquarium (www.MiamiSeaquarium.com)
4400 Rickenbacker Causeway
Key Biscayne, FL 33149
Phone: 305-361-5705 

The Miami Seaquarium is located right in the middle of the tourist area, on the causeway between downtown Miami and Miami Beach. It's a fabulous stop where you can witness an outdoor aquarium experience that's only possible in our tropical climate. Be sure to budget enough time to spend at least half a day there!

Parrot Jungle Island (www.jungleisland.com)
1111 Parrot Jungle Trail
Miami, FL 33132
Phone: 305-400-7200

Parrot Jungle offers visitors a fun, educational opportunity to get an up-close look at tropical birds in replicas of their natural habitats. The attraction routinely hosts field trips and offers frequent educational programs.

Miami Metrozoo (www.miamimetrozoo.com)
1 Zoo Boulevard
12400 SW 152 Street
Miami, FL 33177
Phone: 305-251-0400 

Miami MetroZoo is fast becoming one of the best zoos in the nation. Its climate allows it to keep a wide variety of animals from Asia, Australia and Africa like no other zoo in the country. One of the first free-range zoos in the country, the exhibits are entirely cageless. Animals are grouped according to their geographic territory and animals that live together peacefully in the wild are placed in exhibits together.

Vizcaya (www.vizcayamuseum.org)

3251 South Miami Avenue,
Miami, FL 33129
Phone: (305) 250-9133

No visit to Miami is complete without a stop at the historical 50-acre Vizcaya estate. This European-style mansion offers a glimpse at life in turn-of-the-century South Florida. It's also an extremely popular venue for galas, weddings and other entertainment events. 

Bayfront Park (www.bayfrontparkmiami.com)
301 North Biscayne Boulevard
Miami, Florida 33132
Phone: 305-358-7550

This park has two amphitheaters (one large and a one smaller) and hosts live performances. This park also has memorials for the astronauts who perished in the Challenger spaceship accident, former president John F. Kennedy (the JFK Torch of Friendship), and a fountain dedicated to Claude Pepper, a distinguished US congressman.

Monkey Jungle (www.monkeyjungle.com)
14805 Southwest 216th Street
Miami, FL 33170-2299
Phone: (305) 235-1611

"Where the humans are caged and the monkeys run wild" - it's more than a catch-phrase. Monkey Jungle in southern Miami-Dade County is a truly unique park. While homo sapiens walk through carefully constructed wire pathways, many species of primates scamper above your head, swing through trees and interact with each other in ways difficult to observe in captivity. Keep your eyes open; you never know who's hanging around! 

Fort Lauderdale Beach (ci.ftlaud.fl.us/beach/index.htm)

Fort Lauderdale Ocean Rescue supervises the two miles of continuous public beach from the South Beach Picnic Area up to and including the beach in front of Hugh Taylor Birch State Park. In the guarded areas of the beach, there are 15 year-round, permanently staffed lifeguard towers spaced between 200 and 400 yards apart. There are also as many as 10 temporary-auxiliary stands that are used during the peak season, special events and holidays

Key Biscayne (www.key-biscayne.com)

Key Biscayne, Florida, a tropical island paradise just six miles off the coast of Miami, Florida, is a world-class resort community and premier vacation destination.  Key Biscayne offers a wide variety of outdoor recreational activities including bicycling, tennis, golf, fishing, kite boarding, windsurfing, boating, sailing and waterbikes.  In addition, the unsurpassed safety of this island paradise and the people of the community, make Key Biscayne not only a popular vacation destination, but one of the best and most beautiful places to live in the world!

Key Largo (fla-keys.com/keylargo/)

Key Largo is an island in the upper Florida Keys archipelago and, at 33 miles (53 km) long, the largest of the Keys. Key Largo is a popular tourist destination and calls itself the "Diving Capital of the World" because the living coral reef a few miles offshore attracts thousands of scuba divers and sport-fishing enthusiasts. Key Largo's proximity to the Everglades also makes it a premier destination for kayakers and ecotourists. Automotive and highway pioneer and Miami Beach developer Carl G. Fisher built Key Largo's famous Caribbean Club in 1938 as his last project.

Jackie Gleason's Mausoleum (www.roadsideamerica.com/story/13867)

Jackie Gleason -- a.k.a. Ralph Kramden from The Honeymooners -- retired to the southeast coast of Florida in the 1960s because he wanted to play golf every day. He was a show biz guy who liked good cigars and loud Hawaiian shirts, and one would think that his tomb -- he died of cancer in 1987 -- would be a gaudy affair that would overlook a golf course in some ritzy place like Miami Beach. Instead, it's about as far inland as it's possible to get in Miami, in a relatively modest Catholic cemetery, under the landing path of the jets at the international airport. It appears to be the largest grave in the cemetery, but that's not saying much. Most of the other graves are mounted flush with the ground, so Jackie's stands out.

Coral Castle Museum (www.coralcastle.com)

Coral Castle is a stone structure created by the Latvian American eccentric Edward Leedskalnin north of the city of Homestead, Florida in Miami-Dade County at the intersection of U.S. 1 (South Dixie Highway) and Southwest 157th Ave. The structure comprises numerous megalithic stones (mostly limestone formed from coral), each weighing several tons.