Cuba. 2019. Summary Cuba, an island of contradictions. Havana is a busy city where there are obviously people making a reasonable living and some taxi drivers etc. wearing heavy gold and using smart phones and yet you see beggars on the street and older people with lowly jobs looking impoverished. I think most people are quite industrious and willing to make money wherever they can but there appears to be working age people stood about, or queuing up for meat or something. These paradoxes also apply to the countryside but with the emphasis of more on the poorer end. Much farm work is done by horse and pony and old Russian tractors. A few farms had larger and more modern tractors but I suspect these were government owned and run by cooperatives. There are large area ... read more

Day 12 Matanzas. 1 February 2019 36 miles of flat roads today. But what a night. Awoke at 4am with severe stomach cramps which continued on and off until 7am. Here we go again. John is the same. I have never been almost all over the world and never experienced the quantity of people falling ill like this. Three more days and back to our own food and water should settle it. The riding was heading north west to Matanzas through arable country with some newish big tractors and machinery mixed in with the old. The crops were vegetables, sugar cane, grain and acres of fruit trees. Lunch was at an Eco Farm, which was the same standard of loads of vegetables, rice, beans, salad and a variety of meats. Great but much too much food ... read more

Day 10 Cuba. 30 January 2019 Vamos- Off we go into another brilliant Caribbean sunny day with zero cloud. Out of town, the way we came in, along the coast heading west to Cienfuegos with all but one of our group riding, which is almost a first from day 1 with people going down like flies with stomach upsets. 12 out of 17 have been affected and the remaining 5 are holding their breath. The wind was on our tail and the sun on our backs again for most of the ride until we reached the Botanical Gardens for another excellent lunch. The lamb was superb with meat just falling off the bone. We had a short tour of the trees before we left to see the 300 species of palm trees held there, plus loads ... read more

Cuba Day 8. Monday 28 Jan 61km. 570m ascent 29 degrees cycled today. An early start at 8.15 after deciding on plan D. The cause of much plan changing was the likely bad weather conditions following a tornado yesterday in Havana which left 3 dead and 176 injured. We eventually decided not to travel up the hills to Trinidad but to cycle around it. This was a very good choice of route since the wind was quite strong but on our tail on the undulating road. Whilst the day started with damp roads, and the necessary puddles, the cloud cleared somewhat and the sun shone on our backs as we headed south west. The road was the best so far with few potholes and fairly light traffic and we sailed along nicely until midday and Liz ... read more

Cuba. Day 6. Saturday. Not good news today in Vinales. In the middle of the night I was taken down with severe stomach pains and the rest that goes with it. The same thing happened to Paul two days ago and he is now feeling a lot better. Consequently I have been in bed all day with the tablets and water. It was not until early evening that the pain got to be bearable. Not nice. Luckily this is a two night stay and I still had the room at our Bed and Breakfast (casa particulares). The rest of the group were cycling to the ferry at Cayo Jutia and then onto the nearby island and the beach for snorkelling etc. However, it was a bit wild for going in the water and it rained from ... read more