The Crossing
Small Plane Flights Miami to Bimini
Bimini is the closest Bahamian island to Florida and it has a runway, which is the whole reason this flight is simple. South Bimini Airport carries the identifiers BIM and MYBS and an asphalt strip of 5,430 feet. A small charter plane lands there on wheels, the same as it would at home.
The water between is about fifty nautical miles wide and almost none of it has anything on it. You leave the Florida coast behind within a minute or two, cross the deep blue of the Gulf Stream and the colour changes under the wing long before the island appears.
What that runs in block time depends on the aircraft and the departure point and it comes back with the quote.
Everything between those two moments is ours: the departure point in Miami, the aircraft and the crew, both border filings and the travel documents the Bahamas wants before you leave Florida. Your party brings passports and a bag.
This is the shortest international crossing we fly out of Miami and one of several Small Plane routes from the city. Where an island has no strip at all, the same trip is flown by seaplane instead, which is a different aircraft and a different page.
Plan Your Bimini Charter
How It Works
How a Small Plane Charter Miami to Bimini Actually Works
Bimini is a different country, so a day there is two border crossings in one afternoon. On this route both of them happen at an airport, so it stays simple. Nothing about the paperwork is yours except the passports.
The short version: you clear out of Florida, you land at South Bimini, you clear in at the desk beside the apron and you are on the island.
Plan Your Bimini CharterThe Runway
The runway at South Bimini is the reason this works on wheels
The strip runs 09/27 and measures 5,430 feet of asphalt, which is a long way more than a small small plane needs. It sits at the southern end of South Bimini, a few minutes from the water on either side. There is no approach over terrain and nothing to circle, so a landing here is an ordinary one.
The Border
Customs and immigration sit at the Bimini airport, not somewhere on the way
The Bahamian customs authority lists South Bimini Airport as a port of entry, which is the part that matters for a private flight. On islands without one an aircraft has to touch down at a port of entry first and carry on afterwards.
Here it does not. You land where the desk is, the crew files the manifest before departure and the travel documents are checked in Florida rather than at the counter.
Leaving Miami
Leaving Miami is the quieter of the two borders
Outbound from Florida the filing is done for you and the aircraft departs from a general aviation ramp rather than a terminal. You arrive at the departure point close to the boarding time, not two hours before it.
Coming home is the step people forget: a return from the islands clears United States customs at a designated field and the crew plans the routing around that not around the shortest line.
The Last Mile
Getting to North Bimini is a taxi and a short boat
Almost everything visitors come for is on North Bimini and the airport is on the south island. The link is a five to ten minute taxi to the dock and a ferry ride of about the same again, running through the day and informal about it.
It is a genuine extra step compared with putting floats down at Alice Town and it buys you a runway that works when the water does not.
Weather
Weather closes water before it closes the Bimini runway
A rough morning can make a water landing a bad idea while a paved strip is entirely unbothered. That is the practical argument for wheels on this crossing in winter and it is the reason we quote both. What the aircraft needs on the day is a crew decision, taken against published minimums, never a preference.
The Block
The small plane waits, which is what makes a Bimini day trip a day trip
On a charter the airframe is yours for the block, so the return is set by you rather than by a timetable. Guests who want a night on the island tell us at the enquiry and the crew and the aircraft are planned around it. Nothing about the day is shared with anybody else's schedule.
Departure Points
Departure Points for Small Plane Flights to Bimini from Miami
A small plane uses short fields that a jet cannot, so the departure point is chosen for your ground time. These are the four we use around Miami. Select one to see exactly where it sits.
Miami Executive
Miami Executive Airport, TMB, Kendall
Kendall-Tamiami in the south west of the county and the field both small planes sit at, the land aircraft and the amphibian. A charter that starts here starts without a positioning leg, which is what decides an early morning on a same day return. It is also the shortest drive from the south and west of the county.
Opa-locka Executive
Miami-Opa Locka Executive Airport, OPF
The executive airport north west of the city, with private terminal handling and the point most Bahamas day trips are dispatched from. It is also where a return from the islands clears US customs. That makes it the default on a Bahamas day unless the drive is against you.
Miami International
Miami International Airport, MIA
A pickup rather than a base, for a party already at MIA that wants the onward leg to leave from the same airport. Arranged per flight and confirmed with the operator before it is quoted. It costs ground time, because a commercial field moves on its own schedule.
Fort Lauderdale Executive
Fort Lauderdale Executive, FXE
Fort Lauderdale Executive, the Broward departure, with its own federal inspection station for the return from the islands. The usual choice when the group is north of Miami and the drive south would cost more time than the flight saves. The return clears there as readily as it does at Opa-locka.
How to Charter
Charter a Small Plane from Miami to Bimini
Chartering an aircraft is not booking a seat. There are four steps, and only the first one is yours.
Plan Your Bimini Charter- 01
Contact Us
Write to us on WhatsApp or by email. Send your dates, how many guests, where you are coming from and where you want to travel. Tell us the hour you would like to leave. A small plane runs airport to airport. Your pickup can also be a marina, a hotel dock or a beach. With a seaplane we can collect you there.
- 02
Get Aircraft and Prices Back
We check what is free on your date and send the small planes that fit. Seats, baggage and flight time for each one. Every aircraft costs a little differently, so we can find the best fit for you.
- 03
Confirm and Pay
You pick the aircraft, and we set the pickup point and the landing site. Then everything around the flight. Catering on board, a car or a golf cart waiting when you land, ground transport to your hotel or back to the airport.
Flowers if the day is a special one. You approve it, you pay, and your boarding time, departure point and everything included come back to you.
- 04
Just Arrive 30 Minutes Early
You will have no terminal and no queue. Just make sure you are there 30 minutes before. Then you take off, land right at your destination, and enjoy the day.
On the Island
Where a Miami to Bimini Small Plane Puts You Down
The aircraft puts you on the runway at the southern end of South Bimini, which is the quiet half of the island and the half with the border desk on it. Everything below is reached from there and the first step of most days is a short ride and a shorter boat.
What follows is what parties actually do with the hours in between, in the order they ask for it.
Plan Your Bimini CharterThe Bimini Runway and the Border Desk
Where You LandThe strip runs east to west across the bottom of South Bimini, 5,430 feet of asphalt with water at both ends. From the air it looks improbably short and from the seat it is an ordinary landing, because a small small plane needs a fraction of it.
The terminal is one building. Customs and immigration are inside it, which is the fact that shapes this whole route: the Bahamian customs authority lists South Bimini Airport among its ports of entry, so you clear where you land rather than somewhere along the way.
Expect the formalities to take minutes rather than an hour. The crew has filed everything before departure and the desk keeps daytime hours, which is the one reason an early slot is worth more than a late one.
Say at the enquiry if anyone is travelling on a passport other than a United States one, because that is the case worth flagging before the day rather than at the counter.
South Bimini Itself
The Quiet Half
The south island is the residential one. Low scrub, a few roads, houses and the airport and almost none of the bars and hotels people picture when they hear the name. That is not a drawback for a day trip, it is the reason the arrival is calm.
There is no crowd at the strip and no queue for the boat. The nature trail and the fresh water spring on this side are a short ride from the apron for anybody who would rather not cross at all and a golf cart can be waiting when you land through ground transport.
The Ferry Across to Alice Town on Bimini
Ten Minutes
The two islands are separated by a channel a few hundred yards wide and the link is a taxi of five to ten minutes from the apron to the dock, then a ferry of about the same again.
It runs through the day, it is informal and it is the one genuine extra step this aircraft has that a water landing does not. It is also the step that buys you a paved runway, which is the better trade on a winter morning or with a load on board.
Guests who would rather not do it at all fly the same route by seaplane to Alice Town instead. We quote both against each other rather than selling one, because which is right depends on the date, the water and what the party is carrying.
North Bimini and King's Highway
Where the Hotels Are
Across the channel the island is seven miles of sand with one road down the middle. The resort strip and the big marinas sit at the north end, the older game fishing club and the bars of Alice Town along King's Highway and the ocean-side beaches a few minutes apart from either.
Nothing on that island is far from anything else, so a day here works and a day further down the chain does not. Golf cart is the transport and walking is the alternative.
What there is to do once you are across is the island's own subject rather than the flight's and the Bimini destination page covers it properly. Guests who want a table booked before they land add a fly and dine day and anything outside the usual list goes to custom requests.
The Sapona, Minutes From the Bimini Strip
Snorkel Depth
The wreck of the Sapona, a concrete ship left standing where she grounded, sits in about fifteen feet of water off the south end of the island. That is the end you land on, which makes it the closest thing on Bimini to the runway.
Fifteen feet is shallow enough that snorkellers and divers are looking at the same thing from different depths and the hull stands clear of the surface, so you see it from the air on the way in. Boats run out to it from both islands.
Cat Cay and Gun Cay, South of Bimini
Also on the Customs List
The chain carries on south from Bimini and the next links are Gun Cay and Cat Cay, a few minutes further by air. Honeymoon Harbour on the Gun Cay side is the beach where the rays come in shin deep over pale sand.
Cat Cay is on the same Bahamian ports of entry list as South Bimini Airport, which is worth knowing if a trip is built around the club not around Bimini. It is a private club: the marina and the houses are for members and their sponsored guests, so for everyone else it is a stop seen from the water rather than a place to book into.
Clubs, Tanks and a Cooler on a Small Plane
What Wheels Carry
This is the part of the day a runway changes most. Load on a small aircraft is a weight question rather than a bag count and a wheeled airframe has more of it to give than floats do.
Golf clubs, dive tanks, rods, a cooler for the boat, a case of something for the house: all of it travels, within the payload for the aircraft on the day.
Say what is coming at the enquiry rather than at the ramp and see the baggage guidance for how the trade between passengers and weight actually works. Anything larger than luggage is a different service on the same runway and that is island logistics rather than a charter with extra bags.
Onward Down the Chain by Small Plane
Same Aircraft
Bimini works as the first leg rather than the whole day and clearing in here is what makes that easy: once you are through the desk at South Bimini, every leg after it is domestic. The same airframe carries on east and south to Grand Bahama, Nassau, Harbour Island, Andros or Staniel Cay and the Exumas.
That is what turns one island into island hopping or a wider Bahamas day. Where the next island has no strip of its own, that leg switches aircraft rather than cancelling the plan. The packaged version of a single day is the Bimini getaway day trip and the rest of the chain is on the Bahamas destinations page.
Ready When You Are
Ready to Book a Small Plane Charter from Miami to Bimini?
Send the departure point, the number of guests and from when to when. You get back what is free on your dates, the boarding time and what the day costs, before anything is booked.
Add-Ons
Small Plane Flights to Bimini Add-Ons
Tell us which of these you want when you send your dates and they go on the same quote as the flight.
In Detail
Small Plane Miami to Bimini: The Runway, the Border and the Ferry
Everything above is the day. What follows is the detail behind it: the strip at the far end, the border that sits beside it, the water crossing and what charter and private actually change about a flight to the Bahamas.
Miami to Bimini by Small Plane: Flying Low Over the Reef and the Flats
Room enough and a window each on a Bimini small plane
The crossing is not dead time between two airports. A small plane crosses low enough to see what is under it, so the water is part of the day rather than something to sit through. A small aircraft flies low and slow: the Gulf Stream goes from navy to light, then the bank comes up turquoise. Bimini sits on the edge of the Gulf Stream, which is why the drop-off is so abrupt: deep water on one side of the wing and a few feet of sand on the other, in the space of a minute. The Sapona sits in about fifteen feet of water off the south end and is plainly visible from above on a clear morning, and so are the flats, the sandbars and the darker line of the reef. Everything else is filed before departure; the travel documents page lists what we need and by when. Every seat is a window seat on an aircraft this size, and the same is true of scenic flights of this size, so nobody watches the crossing over someone's shoulder. Other small plane routes from Miami fly the same way.
Small Plane to Bimini from Miami: You Decide the Departure Time
Your hour, your names and a small plane to Bimini
Nobody hands you a timetable on a charter. The day is built around the hour you name. You name the hour you want to lift off, the hour you want to be standing on Bimini and which water in the city suits your morning. The aircraft belongs to your party for the day, so all three are your decision rather than a departure somebody else set, and a change the week before is a message to us. If the drive is shorter the other way, the same day runs out of Fort Lauderdale. Half an hour before the lift-off is the whole of the check-in. Your party walks from the car to the aircraft, the bags go on in front of you, and the list for that flight carries your names and nobody else's. Nothing about the morning waits on a stranger. Everything else is filed before departure; the travel documents page lists what we need and by when. And the crossing is a reason in itself. The windows are deep and the aircraft crosses low, so there is room for everybody to sit and watch the water change instead of taking turns at one of them.
Small Plane Charter to Bimini from Miami: The Crew Files Both Borders, You Carry a Passport
Passports are all your party carries on a Bimini crossing
A small plane from Miami to Bimini crosses an international border twice in a day. It is the part that goes wrong when nobody files it in advance. Entry into the Bahamas asks for a declaration filed from Florida, clearance at a port of entry on arrival and a US return filed before you leave, which is what sets where you may land coming home. On a Crown Air charter the crew files all three. Passports for everyone, children included, per the travel documents guidance. What may travel sits in the baggage guidance. That same filing sets where you land coming home: a return from the islands clears at None, so a day that began on the water finishes on a ramp and a departure moved by weather runs under the weather and delays policy. If the party changes before the flight, the crew refiles. A name added, a name dropped: that is a message to us rather than a problem for you.
Small Plane Miami Bimini: Milestone Days and Bahamas Weekends
A day trip, a long weekend or something to celebrate on Bimini
A private small plane from Miami to Bimini is booked when the day is worth marking: a birthday, a proposal, a graduation, a weekend away with the people who matter. The flight is short enough that the occasion, not the travelling, is what the day is about. That is what a small plane Miami Bimini charter is for. Three of the four sit well inside the county, which is the part that decides how early the morning starts: a field twenty minutes from the house is worth more than five minutes of flight time saved in the air. Some parties fly over for the day and are home the same evening. Others stay on and book the return for the day they want. Both are the same charter, and the whole group travels together on one booking. If there is something to celebrate, say so when you book: catering, a private chef, premium beverages and flowers travel with you. Everything is in place before you board in Miami.
Questions
Small Plane Charter Miami to Bimini: Questions Answered
Can a plane land in Bimini?
Yes. South Bimini Airport has an asphalt runway of 5,430 feet, identifiers BIM and MYBS, which is more than a small charter aircraft needs. It sits on the south island and is also the border post, so a private flight lands and clears in the same place. The north island, where the hotels are, is a short taxi and ferry away.
Do I need a passport to fly to Bimini?
Yes, for every passenger including children. The Bahamas is a different country and a private aircraft does not change that. We take the passport details once at the enquiry and file the manifest for both sides before departure. The travel documents page lists what each passenger hands over and by when, including the cases that need more notice.
How long is the flight from Miami to Bimini?
The water is about fifty nautical miles wide, which makes this the shortest international crossing flown out of Miami. The block time depends on the aircraft and which field you leave from and it is confirmed with the boarding time before you book. What actually sets the length of the day is not the flight, it is the two borders and how long the aircraft waits for you.
What is the best way to get to Bimini?
By air and then it depends on where you want to end up. A small plane lands on the runway at South Bimini, which is dependable in any weather the water is not.
A seaplane puts you at Alice Town on the north island with no ferry. The ferry from Florida is the third option and it costs most of the day. We quote the first two against each other.
Where does the flight land in Bimini?
At South Bimini Airport, at the southern end of the south island. Customs and immigration are there, so you clear on arrival rather than somewhere on the way. From the apron it is a five to ten minute taxi to the dock and a ferry of about the same again across to Alice Town, where most of the hotels, restaurants and marinas are.
Can you take a day trip to Bimini?
Easily and it is the most common way this route is flown. On a charter the aircraft is held for your block, so the return is set by you rather than by a timetable. Out in the morning, back in the evening, with both borders handled either side. Tell us at the enquiry if you would rather stay a night and the aircraft is planned around that instead.
How much baggage can we take on a small plane?
It is a weight question rather than a bag count. A small aircraft trades payload against passengers and fuel, so four guests with dive tanks and four with overnight bags are different aircraft. Say what is coming at the enquiry, including clubs, rods and anything with a battery in it and the answer comes back with the quote rather than at the ramp.
Is Bimini good for families?
It suits families well for a day out of Miami: the crossing is short, the water is shallow and warm on the bank side and the island is small enough to see in a day by golf cart. Children need passports like everybody else. On a private aircraft there is no terminal and no queue, which is usually the part that makes the difference with small children.
Can we fly on to another island from Bimini afterwards?
Yes. The same airframe carries on east down the chain and because you have already cleared into the Bahamas at Bimini the onward legs are domestic. That makes Bimini a natural first stop on a longer trip rather than only a destination. Tell us the shape of the trip at the enquiry and it is quoted as one movement.
What happens if the weather is bad on the day of the Bimini flight?
A paved runway tolerates a great deal that a water landing does not, which is the main practical argument for this aircraft in winter. If conditions are genuinely below minimums the crew moves or stands down the flight and the weather and delays policy says what that means for your booking. That call is the crew's, made against published limits, never a preference.
Is it cheaper than a scheduled flight?
No and it is not trying to be. A scheduled seat is cheaper because somebody else chose the time and the aircraft is shared. Charter buys the block: your departure, your return, your party only, your load. On a day trip that usually means several more usable hours on the island, which is the comparison worth making rather than fare against fare.
What do we do once we are there?
That is the island's own question rather than the flight's and the Bimini destination page covers it properly. In short: the beaches and the harbour at Alice Town, the flats and the reef, the Sapona wreck in about fifteen feet of water and the cays just south. Anything you want arranged before you land is set up with the flight.
Can I bring a pet on a small plane charter?
Yes, pets travel in the cabin with you. The one thing we ask is that you tell us at the enquiry, with the type of animal and its weight, so the seating and the load plan are right from the start.
Next Step
Ready to Book a Small Plane Charter Miami to Bimini?
Send the departure point, the number of guests and from when to when. You get back the aircraft, the boarding time and what the whole day costs, before anything is booked.
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