Blogs from Cuba, Central America Caribbean - page 55

After the cold and rain of the Andes, I decided to finish my trip with a month of sun, salsa and partying in Cuba. The flights worked out the same price to fly to the UK via Cuba or from La Paz directly. When I arrived in Havana airport the difference to South America was very noticeable. At midnight the air was humid and the temperature was still in the high 20s. We took a taxi in a 1950s Buick to a soundtrack of salsa with an extroverted afro-cuban taxi driver who flirted outrageously with the two Danish girls I had met in the impossibly slow immigration queue. Despite that it took me several days to organise the paperwork and a morning to obtain the visa, the officials didn't ask me to produce any of the ... read more

Next morning we ate brekky, Dario went to the bank while I packed and at 9am a bicitaxi with built in stereo system picked us up to take us to the bus station to catch one to Santiago de Cuba. The bus was 30 mins late, but we got on and arrived in Santiago at 12.30pm. A driver was waiting for us with a sign as Lidia´s sister runs a Casa in Santiago and we had organised to stay there. The driver drove us in a tiny little fiat with our bags tied to the roof to our grande casa. It was much bigger than any we had stayed in before, and really nice! We organised everything then headed out in search of lunch. After trying a few places we ate at a small place called ... read more

Habana Vieja Habana Vieja is the criss-cross network of narrow streets and squares which formed the original town. One of the guidebooks suggests there are more than 900 buildings of historical significance in this small area and I find that easy to believe. Like in other areas of Havana, every building seems to be an architectural treasure and I have no idea how many museums there are here – almost every building seems to hold some sort of collection. I’m told by my Cuban friends that the whole area was seriously dilapidated a few years ago. A lot of work has been done alongside UNESCO in restoring four of the main squares and some of the surrounding streets. Eusebio Leal Spengler, the city historian who has initiated a lot of the work and attracted much of ... read more

Next morning we had to get up super early to have breakfast as our bus left at 7am. We left as the sun was risng. The bus to trinidad took all day, we arrived at about 4 (the timetable says arrival at 2, but we were late). We stopped at a few places on the way for food and bathrooms. The casa in Viñales had organised a casa in Trinidad for us and they were waiting for us with a sign once more. I went with the bags and the hostess on a bicitaxi to the casa while the boys walked. It was a bumpy ride as most of the streets are cobble stone. The room was up on the second floor with a kind of balcony that was the roof of the floor below. The ... read more

Look Up! Look Down! Vedado The area of Cuba I’m staying in is Vedado. This area seems to be mainly a middle-class residential area developed from the 1920s onwards. It has also houses Havana University, many hospitals and a lot of the city’s hotels and nightclubs – it had been a favourite haunt of the Mafia until Fidel chased them out of town. I’m staying about 10-minutes walk from The Malecon, the “boulevard” which runs along the sea-front. My plan is that after classes I will walk down to the sea and find a spot on the Malecon to sit, read and chill-out. For the first few days I nearly don’t make it to the Malecon. I’m not an expert on architecture but I find the strange mix of styles in Vedado fascinating. The danger when ... read more