The Best Things to Do in Miami This Weekend

Get ready, Miami: The final holiday weekend of high season starts today. For the next four days, you'll run into a party everywhere you go, especially if that happens to be in South Beach. If you're feeling like a three-day bender, don't despair: Geek convention Mizucon and a new exhibit at the Museum of Art + Design will help balance out the booze.

Friday

A whole lotta vroom will happen along the sands of South Beach this Memorial Day weekend. In addition to offering plane demos and water spectacles galore, the Hyundai Air & Sea Show boasts more than four city blocks of interactive displays, military tributes, and other diversions. Highlights of the weekend include a Flo Rida performance, a fireworks extravaganza, and a unique night-pyro parachute demonstration by the U.S. Army Golden Knights. Friday and Saturday along Ocean Drive in Miami Beach. Tickets start at $25 via usasalute.com.

Saturday

The British know how to rock out. Case in point: Britain's Four Tet and Ben UFO. The artists are coming together for a show at Club Space this Saturday evening. Four Tet, known for his stint with the band Fridge, has since mixed tracks by the likes of Radiohead, Lana Del Rey, Ellie Goulding, Sia, and Black Sabbath. With roots in the dubstep realm, Ben UFO has since branched into house, garage, and other styles, further solidifying himself as a global force. 11 p.m. Saturday at Club Space, 34 NE 11th St., Miami; clubspace.com. Tickets cost $20.

Getting mono the kissing disease is not fun. Monolink, on the other hand, is something you'll want to catch. With a style that often transcends genres, Monolink is the quintessential singer/songwriter/producer extraordinaire. From thumping bass to guitar riffs to hypnotic synths, Monolink always strikes that happy, jammin' medium. For a preshow playlist, don't neglect the morsels from his latest LP, Amniotic, which dropped last year. 11 p.m. Saturday at Floyd, 34 NE 11th St., Miami. Tickets cost $10 to $30 via eventbrite.com.

Oh, look how you've grown, Miami J'ouvert. The colorful Caribbean fest, inspired by a Trinidad slavery-emancipation celebration in the 1800s, started locally in 2002 with approximately 700 Caribbean-Americans dancing and covered in body paint. These days, more than 3,000 people show up for the body paint-, powder-, and water-filled fest. So what can you expect Saturday evening at Mana Wynwood? Be prepared to shake your rump to international tunes, get messy in the most colorful and beautiful way possible, and make some friends along the way. 10 p.m. to 4 a.m. Saturday at Mana Wynwood, 318 NW 23rd St., Miami. Tickets cost $30 to $75 via eventbrite.com.

Sorry, Christmas — in South Florida, the opening of water-park season is the most wonderful time of the year. This weekend, Grapeland Water Park will open for sweaty Miamians. Among Grapeland's features are Shipwreck Island, with two mammoth slides and water-shooting cannons; Pirate's Plunge, with three slides and splash fountains; the Captain's Lagoon heated pool; and the relaxing Buccaneer River Ride. Just be sure to wear sunscreen so you don't roast like a lobster. 10 a.m. Saturday at Grapeland Water Park, 1550 NW 37th Ave., Miami; miamigov.com. Miami-Dade resident adult tickets cost $12; various discounts are available.

Our Caribbean friends know how to throw down. If you don't know that already, hit the 13th-annual Best of the Best Concert Sunday at Bayfront Park. The annual shindig celebrates all Caribbean nations and is packed with cultural bites, vendors, and flags of the islands waving everywhere. Oh, yeah, and there are stellar tunes too. Headlining this year's fest are Shabba Ranks, the "Don Dada" Super Cat, Alkaline, and Jahmiel. 2 p.m. Sunday at Bayfront Park, 301 N. Biscayne Blvd., Miami. Tickets cost $50 to $399 via bestofthebestconcert.com.

Calling all anime lovers: It's your time to shine (and prep for some cosplay action). Mizucon is set to return to the Hilton Miami Airport with a slew of special guests, activities, and exhibitors. Highlights of this year's show include the first-ever Mizu Stars idol singing competition, a performance by comedian Aaron Pabon, a James Bond-inspired Shaken Not Stirred Burlesque, and a martial arts performance by Daniel and Jillian Coglan. Saturday and Sunday at Hilton Miami Airport, 5101 Blue Lagoon Dr., Miami. Day passes start at $20 via mizucon.com.

Remember the good ol' days of art walks in Wynwood back in the early Aughts? Those days are over. But you can wax nostalgic about them at a newer event combining art, booze, and light exercise: Doral Art & Sip. Visitors at CityPlace Doral can check out live painting by artists David Banegas, Alejandra Estefania, Gotthemojo, Miriam Wimmer Stranberg, Alex Pineco, Alain Georges, Keyani Watkins and Ginartepunto, all with a cocktail in hand from an on-site pop-up bar. You can also expect live body painting and an exotic car exhibit. 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. Saturday, May 25 at CityPlace Doral, 8300 NW 36th St., Doral; cityplacedoral.com. Admission is free. 

Sunday

For a fourth consecutive year, Duck Duck Goose is bringing together some of the area's top chefs to put their unique spins on locally raised and pastured fowl. The result will be a lot of yummy goodness for you to sample. Among this year's list of 20-plus participating chefs are Clark Bowen (Boulud Sud), Jose Mendin (La Placita), and Brian Mullins (Ms. Cheezious). 3 to 7 p.m. Sunday at the Anderson, 709 NE 29th St., Miami. Tickets cost $58 to $93 via eventbrite.com.

Hillary Clinton campaigned on the message that "we are stronger together." The Miami bass community heard her loud and clear, apparently, because nine different bass crews in South Florida have banded together to form the South Florida Bass Union, and they're staging their debut event: The Move. The first iteration of this monthly party at 1306 will feature dubstep legends N-Type and Joe Nice, supported by American Grime. With local heavy hitters of the genre, including Strange Bass, Bassline, and DubDay involved, this is a show no basshead should miss. 9 p.m. Sunday, May 26, at 1306, 1306 N. Miami Ave., Miami; 1306miami.com. Admission costs $15-$30 via eventbrite.com.

Miami is known as the crossroads of the Americas, a place that unites people from diverse backgrounds and cultivates an environment where people get inspired by the different cultures they encounter. At the recently renovated Miami Dade College Museum of Art and Design, the new exhibition “Where the Oceans Meet” delves into the pioneering thought of two Caribbean writers: Lydia Cabrera and Édouard Glissant. Curated by Hans Ulrich Obrist, Asad Raza, Gabriela Rangel, and Rina Carvajal, the exhibition considers notions of shifting and porous borders—geographic, national, cultural, social, racial, ethnic, and linguistic—and how crossing borders has shaped our world. Sunday's opening reception will include a conversation between curators and participating artists and an experimental vocal performance, The Chaos Opera, by Andros Zins-Browne. 3 p.m to 6 p.m. Sunday, May 26 at the Miami Dade College Museum of Art and Design, 600 Biscayne Blvd., Miami; mdcmoad.org. Admission is free.