Fort Lauderdale Beach

If South Beach is Miami showing off, Fort Lauderdale Beach is South Florida with its shoes off. A long, clean strip of sand along the A1A, a low-key promenade that fills with runners at sunrise, and the yacht-lined canals that earned the city its "Venice of America" tag. Australians who find Miami a bit much tend to love it here, and quite a few of our regulars base themselves in Fort Lauderdale and day-trip south.

The logistics are the best in the region. Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International is barely six miles away, a 15-minute ride, so you can be off the plane and toes-in-sand inside the hour. Port Everglades is five minutes from the beach hotels, which makes this the ideal pre-cruise overnight stop: sleep properly, swim in the morning, board your ship after lunch without a single stressful mile.

Beyond the beach, Las Olas Boulevard is the strip worth knowing, a couple of kilometres of restaurants, galleries and bars connecting the sand to downtown. We drop and collect along Las Olas nightly, and a pre-booked ride home beats hunting for a taxi at midnight in the beach traffic.

Fares from FLL start at $89 fixed. Coming from MIA instead, it is around 33 miles and 40 to 55 minutes, also a fixed quote. As always, tolls, waiting time and the meet and greet are already in the number, and the same booking covers your return to either airport or onward to the cruise terminals.

What to expect

• Beachfront hotel drop-offs along the A1A
• 15-minute airport run from FLL
• Port Everglades five minutes away for cruise days
• Evening Las Olas pickups, pre-booked
• Fixed fares from both FLL and MIA