Alright, so I've returned from my trip, and I need to vent...maybe this will help somebody in the future who is considering where to go in Miami, maybe not, but I'm quite unhappy with my experience and want to crash out a little bit.
First and foremost, this trip happened because my brother just turned 30 and felt like he hadn't experienced much in his life since he had been in a long-term relationship for most of his post-college years. None of his friends were able to set aside time to come see him, especially since he put this together on a whim, and I wanted to show up for him since he's family and probably my best friend. He had a good time, and that's all that really matters here - this wasn't about me.
Now...I knew this trip was going to cost me a lot of time and money, so I was already a pretty unhappy camper. Couple that with the fact that my flight was delayed nearly 4 hours meant that I was basically going straight from the airport to the club once I dropped my stuff off at his AirBNB. I finally got in at 12:30AM, and we left by 1AM.
Night One
Based on the recommendations from several people, including my Uber driver from the airport, the first place we would visit was E11even. I was under the impression this would be a club WITH strippers - in reality, it is a strip club WITH clubgoers. Meaning that all the girls there were gorgeous - but they're all working. We were getting stopped by girls every 10 feet on our way to order our drinks, with different strippers propositioning us for lap dances. They were nice to look at, but there really weren't many attractive girls who weren't employees. I met one girl who had a boyfriend, another who was 19 years old and got in with a fake ID before leaving immediately after, and another girl there with her friend. We hit it off and made out, but she wasn't prepared to leave with me because she was looking after her friend, who wasn't having such a good time. It really does stay open 24 hours, though, but by the time I left around 5AM it was pretty much ONLY strippers. I did accept a lap dance from this one, who later tried to proposition me for sex, but I wasn't willing to pay the $500, then $300, then $200 she was asking for. I've never paid for sex, and I wasn't willing to start now.
Night Two
Friday night, the plan was to go to LIV. I had been here several years ago, pre-COVID, and remembered being disappointed by the fact that every attractive girl went straight to a VIP section, leaving the main dancefloor comprised of guys and whales. I would argue that it was even worse this time; EVERYWHERE was somebody's VIP section...the only places we could really go were the 2 side bars to order drinks, and a thin walkway connecting those 2 bars, again, bordered by VIP sections. I became very frustrated with this because I simply could not talk to women - they were all in somebody's VIP section protected by club bouncers. The only saving grace was that my brother had been in conversation with a pick-up artist-esque guy that he somehow befriended on Facebook. He was telling my brother that he would get us a table, skip the line, and not have to pay for drinks. He also had his own private security, along with the girls he brought. My brother and I thought that plan would fall through at the last minute, but surprisingly, it didn't...he just had a pretty sh***y table that was away from the fun, which thankfully got moved to an area behind the DJ later, and was significantly better. Some random girls would ask to join our section as they entered the club, one of whom my brother hit it off with and would end up banging that night. The first group I hit things off with, but the girl I was interested in wasn't "that kind of girl" when I went for the kiss. The next group, I hit it off with the hotter of the two, but her friend had some issue where the pick-up guy wasn't letting her in the section, so she later had to find that friend. The third group, I hit it off with one cute girl, but she had a much hotter friend join soon after, who I diverted my attention to. We hit it off very quickly, I completely ignored the other cute girl, and we started making plans to leave after some time making out.
Side Note: I won't say who this PUA guy is, but he took a picture with the hotter friend and posted it to his Instagram story, saying "game is easy when you work with me", insinuating that he was banging this chick. I found that disingenuous, since that was the chick I left with. So take it with a grain of salt when you watch some of these guys on Instagram or YouTube or whatever, where they make themselves out to be Chad Thunderc*ck.
Anyway...my brother had left with this girl and needed the room, so I invited myself over with the hot friend and one of her friends she came with (also a girl, who, by the way, had to be calmed down because she was crying after getting "r*pe vibes" from the PUA guy meeting them). She told me she's not the kind of girl to have sex the first night meeting a guy, but I figured that was ASD BS (anti-sl*t defense). The Uber was in the parking lot waiting for us...we were literally steps away from it...when some random guys invited us to come onto their boat...And just like that, the girls forgot about our return trip. It was 3 guys, and there were 2 girls hanging out there before we arrived. As it would turn out, these guys maintain the boat - it's not even theirs. My girl told me that I'm her boyfriend for the night, and was worried that the guys might be sex traffickers, or something seedy. I'm pretty sure they went to do a line of coke, and I was just chatting with one of the guys upstairs. Her friend kept spending time with the other guys, and we would just be making out on the couch until she returned. She wanted to leave, but apparently, the friend is the decision-maker, so she needed her approval. After disappearing for quite some time, I went to check on them, and they were both in a room with this other guy on the boat, who we only briefly saw when we first got on, who looked to be an older (40s) out-of-shape guy. Everybody was fully clothed, but the girl friend wouldn't let me in and told me to just text my girl later before closing the door. By this point, the other guys on the boat don't know what's going on either, and say they can't get the girls out of the room, and something about thinking they might be prostitutes because they were asking for money or something.
So I Ubered back to the AirBNB, walked around Ocean Drive until my brother finished clapping cheeks at almost 7AM (which he appreciated), then slept for a whole 3 hours before waking up to be hungover for my return flight.
I think I went about this wrong. I think I need to spend the whole weekend here, or stay somewhere else, or visit during the summer months...or something. I spent a good bit of time on the dating apps as well, and got plenty of matches, but nobody was interested in pursuing something with somebody who would only be there for 2 nights. Despite the promiscuous public image of Miami, these women sure didn't seem like it...
And what's unfortunate is that in almost every case outside of the dating apps, the most attractive women were always the workers; at the restaurants, at the clubs, etc. I was just very unhappy with the time I had for how much I spent...and how much more I would've needed to spend to have a better time. The blue-balling at the end there didn't help, but I was especially annoyed by how I couldn't even meet or talk to these women - both at LIV because they were sectioned off, and at E11even because they're all strippers working.
I'll have to see what places like Arizona or Nashville are like, because I really hated this and expected to have much more fun. But at least my brother enjoyed his 30th, so there's that.
Anyway, that's my rant/crash out for the night. Goodnight all.