5 Hidden Gems Miami

Why it made the list: A genuine 12th-century Spanish monastery cloister, built in Segovia in 1141, bought by William Randolph Hearst, dismantled stone by stone, shipped to the U.S. and reassembled in Miami. It's the oldest building in the Western Hemisphere, a serene stone cloister with gardens, hiding in a North Miami neighborhood.

Why it made the list: A public swimming pool unlike any other, carved from a coral rock quarry in 1924, fed by spring water, with waterfalls, caves, stone bridges and Venetian towers. It's on the National Register of Historic Places and it's the most beautiful place to swim in Florida, right in Coral Gables.

Why it made the list: A 1916 Italian Renaissance-style villa on Biscayne Bay, surrounded by formal gardens, fountains, grottos and a carved stone barge sitting in the water offshore. It's one of the most beautiful and photogenic places in the city, part European estate, part tropical garden, and still under-visited by tourists.

Why it made the list: A genuine oddity south of the city, a 'castle' of massive coral-rock megaliths, carved and moved single-handedly by one man, Edward Leedskalnin, between 1923 and 1951, using tools no one fully understands. A rocking nine-ton gate, stone furniture, a sundial. Nobody's quite sure how he did it, and that's the fun.

Why it made the list: A hidden pocket of old Miami in the heart of Coconut Grove, the 1891 bayfront home of a pioneer boat-builder, set in the last surviving tropical hardwood hammock on the mainland, with a lawn running down to Biscayne Bay. Five green, quiet acres most people walk right past. It's the calmest spot in the city.