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Published: February 22nd 2018
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Santiago de Cuba
Stepping back in time EL COBRE - Santiago de Cuba
Our tour today takes us to the town of El Cobre, located about 12 miles northwest of Santiago Bay where our ship is berthed. Since visiting Santiago de Cuba 3 years ago there is now a tourist visa tax imposed. These were organised by the ship prior to our arrival so it meant we did not have long queues as we disembarked and went through passport control. I guess the start off things that are changing here in Cuba following the death of Castro a few years back.
As we leave the small port area somethings have not changed, still the old classic cars, horse carts, pedalos and crowded local buses plying people to and from their daily place of work.
Our ship is the only one in port, we heard that the larger ships visit Havana rather than Santiago de Cuba but for us that meant there was more of a 'local' feel to the city rather than a tourist one.
Our journey took us out into the countryside with the Sierra Maestra mountains giving a different feel to the previous islands we had visited. Cuba is the largest
Santiago de Cuba
Colourful Classics island in the Caribbean.
The down of Cobre grew up around the first open pit copper mine in Cuba in 1532. The British Cobre Mining Company acquired the mine in 1830.
The Sanctuary of the Virgin Charity built in 1926 as a shrine to Our Lady of Charity, the patron saint of Cuba. A beautiful setting on Manoa hill and surrounded by green forest.
The shrine is sacred to all Cubans who come from across Cuba on pilgrimages to pay their respects to (and ask for protection from) a black Madonna, the Virgen de la Caridad (Virgin of Charity).
She is nothing less than the protectress of Cuba, and her image, cloaked in a glittering gold robe can be seen throughout the country. Her parallel figure in Afro-Cuban worship is OchĂșn, goddess of love and femininity, who is also dark-skinned and dressed in bright yellow garments. In 1998 the Pope visited and blessed the shrine, calling the Virgin "La Reina de los Cubanos" (Queen of Cubans), and donated a rosary and crown.
It is customary to offer sunflowers to the Virgin and all around there were stalls selling bouquets and loose sunflowers, some visitors also
Santiago de Cuba
El Cobre Basilica wear yellow clothing when paying their respects to the Virgin.
According to legend, Cuba's patron saint was rescued bobbing in the Bay of Nipe in 1611 by three young fishermen about to capsize in a storm. The Madonna wore a sign that read YO SOY LA VIRGEN DE LA CARIDAD (I am the Virgin of Charity). With the wooden statue in their grasp, they miraculously made it to shore. Pilgrims, who often make the last section of the trek on their knees, pray to her image and place mementos and offerings of thanks for her miracles; Ernest Hemingway, whose fisherman in The Old Man and the Sea made a promise to visit the shrine if he could only land his marlin donated his Nobel Prize for Literature to the shrine, but it was stolen, although later recovered it was never again exhibited at the basilica.
The Virgin sits on the second floor, up the back stairs, encased in glass. When Mass is being said, the push of a button turns the Virgin around to face the congregation. The annual pilgrimage is
September 12, and the patron saint's feast day is
July 25. One can only image the colourful sight
Santiago de Cuba
El Cobre Basilica as pilgrims make their way up to this beautiful shrine.
Following our visit to the fern garden our driver took us through the city of Santiago de Cuba - on previous visits to Cuba we had seen & visited most of the interesting sights but for our trip today it was a drive through the city so the photos are mostly taken from the bus so giving a pink tinge from the darkened windows. We did have a quick photo shoot in the main square with its cathedral, government building and of course the hub-bub of Cuban life.
We passed by Revolutionary Square and heard how on July 26 1952 Fidel Castro led a group of around 120 rebels in an attack on the Moncada Barracks, the bullet holes still visible on the outside of the building today which now houses a museum. This event marked the beginning of the Cuban Revolution.
Santiago de Cuba is situated closer to Haiti and the Dominican Republic than to Havana - a crucial factor in shaping this city's unique identity.
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