Before spending two weeks in Cuba not even I was prepared for quite how many photos I would take... As it turns out my memory card is fit to burst with over a thousand pictures of our adventures so I've decided to split the story into bitesize chunks to make things easier to digest. First stop, Havana!
After a surprisingly easy 9 hour flight of film watching, snacking and napping we arrived at José Martí International airport in the late afternoon. I nervously exchanged the wads of cash we'd brought for cuban pesos or CUCs and then we hopped in a taxi towards the city. The casa particular I'd reserved online for the first few nights of our trip was in
Centro Habana the bustling heart of the town where most locals live. The streets were dusty and full of people lounging on pavements, pushing vegetable barrows and kids kicking balls around. From every doorway pulsed music of some kind and the heat of the day was at it's height.
To cut a long story short it turned out that the owners of our casa had forgotten we were coming (though had been all too keen to take our deposit...) and were in Venezuela. Their son showed us to a tiny stiflingly hot room that wasn't what I had seen online with no glass in the windows, no AC and a sheet strung up to separate the toilet from the bed. We waited for 45 minutes for him to return and sort things out and then just gave up and headed to a hotel on the
Malecón or sea front. The view from our room was pretty impressive:
After soaking up all the cold air we could from our exceptionally loud and doddery AC unit we stepped back out onto the street again to find some dinner.
The food in Cuba is simple stuff though often incredibly tasty. You have the option of either chicken, pork, fish, shrimp or lobster...and rice and beans. Everything comes with rice and beans. As it was now dark and would have been about 2.30am in England we sat on the sea wall for a while and then headed upstairs to bed ready to explore the city the next morning.
Havana, or
La Habana as the locals call it, is exactly as everyone says it is; like stepping back in time.
The
Capitolio is a copy of the original American building and stands proudly like an intricately iced cake surrounded by colourful cars. I thought the vintage car thing would be something for tourists but it turns out that Cuba really is full of these beauties and if you order a taxi you can bet it'll be more interesting than your average British car.
Locals sit hunched around low tables playing dominoes on street corners and queuing for supplies outside ration shops. Believe it or not Cubans still have ration books and are only allowed 1kg of rice and flour a month along with small pieces of meat and cans of beans.
Followed by cries of "my fren' my fren' you wan taxi? cigar? casa?" (the
jineteros or street hustlers in Cuba are everywhere! As a rule of thumb never buy cigars/rum on the street as they're almost certain to be fake) we made our way to
Habana Vieja or the old town. On route we came across some men laying new tarmac on a side road with tools from what looked like the 1950s...
The prison was also an interesting sight with its fortress like walls and prisoners sitting on the inside steps staring through the bars:
We found the cathedral and a smiling little old man gave me a hibiscus flower for my hat.
Other than the incredible whoosh of cold air that hit you whenever anyone entered or left the Museo de Chocolate what drew you inside was the smell; chocolate in all its wonderful forms. We each had a rum truffle and let them melt in our mouths as we wondered past the small exhibits.
Next we found a bar where a man was crushing sugar cane in a press to extract the juice; you could buy a glass mixed with rum and ice.
As we were wandering back to the hotel for an afternoon siesta we came across a little bald man in a baseball cap with a fat cigar clamped between his teeth. He asked us where we were from and told me he was a tattoo artist (he was indeed covered in tattoos). Before we knew it we were off on a tour of the city with him; he didn't speak any English but was happy chattering away in Spanish and telling us everything he knew. He took us to a bar just down the road where we drank mojitos and watched a small band play.
The houses in Havana are 500 years old and literally falling to pieces. You step through the doorway of a crumbling town house to see the marble staircase and nooks carved into the walls where people have made their homes. Everything is original from the immense door with the face of the owner still carved in it to the columns and ceiling.
He took us to see his friend a furniture restorer called "El Chino" who lived in a tiny low ceilinged house behind his workshop. The realities of life as a cuban who has nothing to do with the tourist trade are quite shocking. He lives off his monthly rations and had very little in terms of luxury. He was so proud to show us his cabinet which he used as a shrine to the Santería gods. Santería is a Cuban religion that's a mixture of African and Catholic traditions brought to the island by slaves.
On our last day in Havana we spent the morning exploring and then headed home just in time to miss the afternoon rain. It was supposedly the rainy season in Cuba but only rained a handful of times during our whole trip and then only for an hour or two. The
Malecón was still beautiful in the rain and it wasn't long after it stopped that the sky was gorgeous in the sunset and the
cubanos came out to line the seafront again as they do every night.
We sat watching a lightening storm as it rolled out to sea surrounded by little groups of people chatting, strumming guitars and singing. Havana had been an incredible start to our trip but even after 3 nights I was looking forward to leaving the noise, smells and the bustle behind the next day when we would set off for the next stop on our Cuba adventure; Viñales. Coming soon!
