Trinidad and Cienfuegos, Cuba

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Trinidad and Cienfuegos sit southwest of Havana about 1.5 hours apart, but in very different situations. Cienfuegos is on a bay and was French at the time most of Cuba was Spanish, so the look and feel of the small town is very different than Trinidad or elsewhere in Cuba. It is the sugar cane center and, as a result, the heart of rum country. Trinidad sits inland about a 20 minute drive from the coast. It was the former sugar cane center of Cuba making many Spaniards in Trinidad extremely wealthy at the turn of the 20th century and the small town still reflects that former wealth. Cienfuegos is flat; Trinidad is on a hill. The streets of Cienfuegos are wide and modern; in Trinidad, they're narrow and cobble-stoned.

While sugar cane fed the wealth of both towns, albeit at different times, tourism is the primary economic engine of both towns today.

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Photos

Palacio de Valle, Cienfuegos
Built as a home in the early 20th Century, now a restaurant.

Amazing Lobster Dinner, Trinidad
$10 dinner, including the biggest lobster ever, rice, beans, salad.