How did you decide where to stay?
Thinking of heading down for a Fri-Sun and have heard that one *must* stay in Miami Beach to "experience" Miami. Seems like you had a great time even with staying downtown. Can you share how you decided and how you felt after the fact of not being within walking distance of the beach?
Fair question.
The primary motivating factors for us were (i) price/points and (ii) status, and less so about the beach as a pool was fine for us.
As we are Hilton and Hyatt DIA, I first limited my search to those brands. Within those brands, I saw that each required a ridiculous amount of points as compared to revenue rates (i.e. Hyatt Centric SB for 25,000?! It didn't matter what the revenue rates were, there wasn't anyway I was plopping 25K/night for the Hyatt Centric when I can get the PH MLE for the same price; or the Conrad was 60K HH when regular revenue rates were sub $250).
(And, no I wasn't about to plunk down 35,000 SPG for the W SB for 4 nights.)
Anyway, I was back and forth on the decision until I found a rate of ~$120 at the Conrad which sealed the deal (that's like buying HH at $0.00002 cents per point). Combined that with the fact that we're like 7/7 with Suite Upgrades at Hilton's and we were sold.
Gravy on top was the fact that there is a great Chabad less than ten mins away by foot.
All that said, Mrs. AJK loves hotels and I had heard the W SB is gorgeous, even if the service isn't, so we switched over for the last night. It was the right move for us. Truth be told, even with the beach, I realize I didn't miss it. But that's just me.
