Our Pre-Cruise Stay in Miami Prior to a cruise on the Carnival Glory in April of 2014 we spent a couple of nights at the Bentley Hotel on South Beach. Here's my review, with photos and a few cruise ship videos, too.

We spent two nights at the Bentley Hotel on South Beach
Here are a few pictures
(Most photos & videos taken with my Canon EOS 70D)

The Bentley Hotel
at the Corner of Ocean Drive and 5th Street
on South Beach

The entrance to the Bentley Hotel is somewhat hidden.
It's underneath those umbrellas for the Belini Italian Bistro.
The restaurant's umbrellas totally block the hotel entrance sign.

The hotel has a swimming pool up on the roof, with a beautiful view.
At its deepest point, the pool is only four feet deep.

Here's the view from the rooftop pool area

The Bentley is an older hotel that has recently been remodeled and modernized.  Hotels on South Beach are super-expensive, so we opted for their least expensive room:  a studio with no view.  While I've definitely stayed in far nicer hotel rooms, the thing this hotel had going for it was an outstanding location.  You just couldn't beat being right across the street from one of the best beaches in the world, and being right on Ocean Drive with all the restaurants and night life.  There were two restaurants on the ground floor of the hotel building, and dozens more restaurants and bars to choose from as you walked down Ocean Drive.  It was a fun and memorable stay.

I wrote a review of the Bentley Hotel for TripAdvisor.com
You can ready my review here

All around the city you'll find these automated kiosks for renting bicycles
including one conveniently located right across from the Bentley Hotel

Miami's South Beach is right across the street from the Bentley Hotel
Just walk across the street and go through the park and you're on the beach

Sorry this picture is so crappy...   I shot it with my cell phone.

I'm a cruise ship junkie, so on Saturday afternoon I walked about 7 blocks from the hotel
to South Pointe Park for a view of the cruise ships leaving the port of Miami

Of all the ships we saw that day, I was most excited about the Norwegian Getaway
because we'll be cruising on her later this year

Here's a video I shot of the Norwegian Getaway heading out to sea:

If you want to know why I'm so excited about sailing on the Norwegian Getaway
take a look at this video, and be sure to have the sound turned on

Here's a video of the Carnival Liberty heading out to sea:

While I was shooting cruise ship photos and videos,
there was a very friendly pelican that positioned himself for a nice photo

On our way out of the park we saw a young kid with amazing skateboarding skills for his age:

When our cruise was all over and we were flying home out of Miami International Airport
I shot this video which gives a pretty good aerial view of the Port of Miami at the 3:50 mark

Why We Were In Miami

The whole reason we were in Miami was because of a two-week cruise on the Carnival Glory.
Click here to read all about our cruise!

The Cruise Ships We've Been On

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