Bachelorette Partying in Miami [Travel Recap]

In college, I was never part of a sorority. I always had female roommates, but I don’t think I had ever stayed in a place with a double digit number of friends….until my trip to Miami two weekends ago, when I got a mini taste of what it’d be like to live in a sorority house!

Eleven other women and myself traveled to Miami to celebrate my best friend Meaghan’s upcoming nuptials. She’s getting married in August to her college sweetheart, who I got to know well when I lived with Meg my senior year of college.

I thought it’d be fun to do a recap of the trip and tell you about the places we spent our time and the bachelorette festivities we partook in… and me being my food loving self, to also share my best eats. Let’s get to it!

Where We Stayed

All of the other girls were traveling from my home state of Jersey, and I met up with them in Miami via a flight from LA. We rented out this penthouse suite on Ocean Drive via Airbnb. It was located in the heart of the hustle & bustle of South Beach, situated above a busy restaurant right across from the beach.

The condo had three bedrooms and two bathrooms, with two pullout couches in the living room. It was a cozy setup and everyone had a bedmate: mine was another friend of mine from college, Maria.

Getting ready to go out was a funny process. There were a dozen girls walking around half naked figuring out their outfit for the night. Everywhere you turned there was makeup being done, hair being curled, and someone jumping in the shower, and while we were at max capacity and there was a lot going on, the condo setup didn’t feel too cramped.

The place had some things that needed to be repaired, like our broken bedroom door, but the patio views were awesome and the location was great. The owner was nice enough to let us keep our bags in a nearby condo after our check-out time so that we could enjoy another afternoon at the beach before we left, which was appreciated.

If you’re ever traveling with a big group of people for an occasion like a bachelorette party, I’d definitely recommend renting a house or condo. It worked out really well, and financially it made sense.

Where We Partied  

As you probably know, Miami has a huge nightlife scene. While clubs are not really my thing, I embraced my inner clubby-girl that dances to techno music for a night out at the very trendy LIV, where we got all fancy with a private table full of booze and mixers.

LIV is located inside the Fontainebleau Hotel, which is definitely the most lavish of places that I’ve been to in Miami. We arrived around midnight, which is apparently the earliest that people really go to the club, but it quickly filled up. We all had a ridiculously fun time dancing together, and it was nice to have our own space to chill at, instead of having to be all crowded on the dance floor.

One negative thing I do have to mention that is kind of insane is that the LIV servers refused to give me a glass of water… unless we paid a ridiculous amount of money for half a dozen FIJI waters. I thought this was outrageous and I’ve never heard of such a thing, and the next day when I felt like hell, I was not at all surprised. Not cool, LIV! 

We spent some time the first night at Mango’s Tropical Cafe, which is right down the street from where we stayed. It was packed with people watching the entertainers doing Michael Jackson impersonations, salsa dancing and more. It’s definitely a fun place to go out for drinks and a show.

The bar at The Clevelander Hotel is another place on Ocean Drive that we hung out at one night. It’s a big outdoor sports bar with a festive atmosphere and a good sized dance floor, and also looks like an ideal spot to do some day drinking in Miami.

The (Good) Food We Ate

While I knew that Miami wasn’t exactly going to be a foodie trip, we did have a few good eats on the trip. One night we went to Cibo Wine Bar, an Italian eatery that offers a nice wine list and is full of menu items like homemade pasta.

The vibe at Cibo is definitely up my alley. There was a large wall full of jars of peppers and other foods, and the wine was housed behind a glass wall, where you could see the server, suspended via a harness, bouncing around picking up bottles like a wino version of Spiderwoman. And I couldn’t stop staring at this colorful dangling decor above us:

We split some appetizers, and while I found their bruschetta to be really plain and dry, their fried zucchini and artichoke pieces were tasty. For my entree, I ordered a spinach and ricotta cannelloni with a rose sauce, which tasted really fresh and delicious.

Overall I really liked Cibo and would recommend it for a quieter, more upscale dinner in Miami.

I had remembered finding a really good smoothie joint the last time I was in Miami, so I sought it out on this trip. At the very creatively named spot called The Smoothie Shop, they offer an array of smoothies, salads, wraps, and acai bowls, with smoothie add-in options like protein powders and green superfood boosts.

I ordered a yummy tropical fruit smoothie, and also got a crazy potent ginger and lemon drink to help with my non-existent voice, which I had lost the very first night. What can I say, my vocal chords have always been delicate and don’t appreciate yelling over loud music and being forced to inhale cigarette smoke. 😉

News Cafe is a popular restaurant on Ocean Drive that’s a good spot for a decent breakfast/lunch and some people watching. I enjoyed a fruit & yogurt bowl there for breakfast one morning:

The very last meal I had in Miami might have been the best food I ate the whole trip, and it was at a tiny little joint called Pita Loca. It’s an Israeli eatery with a lot of traditional Middle Eastern items, and the minute I bit into their complimentary hummus and pita bread, I knew it was going to be a good lunch.

I ordered their falafel pita. It may have also had to do with the fact that I was super hungry and also hot, but their warm pitas, flavorful falafel and veggies, and refreshing lemonade really hit the spot.

The Bachelorette Games We Played

• Scavenger Hunt: Throughout the course of the weekend, we played a couple of bachelorette party games. The best one was a South Beach scavenger hunt that the maid of honor arranged. We divided into teams, and had a to-do list to check off, including finding handcuffs, taking a shot of tequila, and borrowing someone’s roller-skates and skating around with them on (What is it with Miami and rollerskating?!).

Can you tell that we got into the scavenger hunt spirit?!

We all had a blast running around like maniacs to win the game, and as you can tell, we also had matching tank tops made specifically for the weekend that we wore during it.

• Ice Breaker: Since the group included people from all different stages in Meg’s life, some people didn’t know each other, so the first night of the trip, we played a game where we each wrote interesting and surprising facts about ourselves on pieces of paper. Each person would randomly pick a fact out of the bowl of folded papers, then have to guess who wrote it down. If you got the answer wrong, you had to take a sip of your drink. Once the person was figured out, they had to take a drink. It was a really easy way to break the ice, and the game wound up being pretty hilarious.

• Kiss the Man’s Boxers: With it being a bachelorette party, it obviously had to get a little raunchy for at least one game. We had a poster of a guy in boxers, then each had to put lipstick on, get blindfolded, and try to kiss the guy in, ahem, a particular area, as demonstrated above, without using our hands to guide us. We were practically all in tears laughing at each other blindly walking around the room trying to find the poster.

Fun in the Sun

And of course, being in Miami, we enjoyed what I think is the best part about the city: its white sand beaches & beautiful water! I’m not even a big ocean swimmer, but it’s just so clear and warm, I spent most of my beach time in the water floating around and staying cool with the girls. These east coast girls were especially appreciating it because they endured a cold winter this year and are just getting into summertime weather in Jersey.

I also got to meet up with my little cousin, Noelle, for an afternoon. She is living not too far away from Miami working in Key Largo as a dolphin trainer, and I’m so glad we got to hang out for a bit together. I wish that I could have extended my trip to come hang out with the dolphins at her facility after the bachelorette party weekend!

While super touristy expensive prices and cigarette smoke (and apparently no free/reasonably priced water at certain bars!) are the downsides to me of South Beach, overall it was an awesome place for a bachelorette party getaway. I had such a blast celebrating a great friend of mine and enjoying Miami for a long weekend, and I’m excited for Meg’s wedding this summer!

(This picture cracks me up!)

Tell me.. Have you ever been to Miami? Have you ever gone on an all girls’ trip?