Cuba

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This February my family took a vacation to Cuba. My dad planned this one, so it was a holiday to a resort with the purpose of snoozing on the beach all day and drinking lots of beer. This is not my ideal type of vacation but it was still a nice getaway with perfect weather and nice facilities. Locals comment that Varadero isn't Cuba, it's tourist. I would agree. It is a nice town and the people are friendly, but they all have something to sell you. My favorite part of the town was their little museum. Its an old beach house tucked in at the end of the street with a big wrap around balcony that overlooks the ocean. The lady working there didn't speak english and the displays were all in spanish, which was actually very appealing to me! Everywhere else you almost forgot you were in a spanish speaking country because everyone speaks english so well (a tour operator told us it is mandatory for Cubans to take english in school). The most interesting part of this trip for me was learning a little more about Cuba's history. It seems as though there has always been someone trying to conquer them! I knew a little of their modern history, and you can still see allusions to the revolution everywhere, but it was nice to get a history lesson on Cuba before Castro. Most of this I learned on a day trip to Havana on a bus packed with other Canadians who were more interested in discussing old cars and what would be for lunch than anything else. The walking tour around Old Havana was great and our tour guide was full of tidbits of information. I would have liked to have spent more time just wandering the streets there, but when you're with a group you do as the group does. The character and energy of the area were fantastic. It was like a european city dropped in the tropics and filled with happy people.

Apart from that the trip was uneventful...a typical resort holiday where you do nothing but relax and get a tan. That in itself was not all bad, I needed to slow down and unwind. Cuba was the perfect place for that.

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Photos

Beach House Museum
my mom and sister enjoying the sunshine at varaderos museum

Che
Havana

the beach
walking into town along the beach. convenient!