Cuba - Part Four

Santiago de Cuba

We got to Santiago quite late in the evening and decided to go to a hotel for the couple of nights we were there as were a bit over the Casas. We found one that wasn't too expensive and was pretty central which was good. The bus station was crazy - as soon as you walked through the door you were hassled by people wanting to give you a taxi/casa/anything you wanted! We bumped into a German guy that we met in Bayamo and he was on his way to Varadero, the all inclusive resort! He was sick of being hassled all the time, so had booked into an all inclusive hotel for a few nights to get away from it all!!!

We spent the next day walking around the town. I had heard lots of bad things about Santiago - it was really polluted, it was a little bit unsafe, there was loads of hassle etc etc but we found none of that and it was actually an OK place to spend a day.

I decided to go on the internet, which I didn't think would be that hard. In every town there is the same telephone company and you buy prepaid (expensive obviously!) cards for an hour. I had one I bought already and had 1/2hr left on it that I wanted to use. I went into the shop and tried to log on to the computer but it wouldn't work. After speaking to someone there apparently I had the wrong type of card so I either had to go somewhere else or buy a new one. She directed me to this other place and I didn't think I had a hope in hell of finding it but it was actually exactly where she said it would be. Out of 4 computers my card only worked on the one that someone else was using and 2 other people were waiting for. But I had nothing else to do so said I would wait. After 10 mins or so this girl had finished using the computer and the guy who worked there had a word to these 2 Cubans who were waiting and they walked off so I was next up. I'm not sure what happened and felt bad that I was taking priority over them but there wasn't much I could do about it so I just went on the computer!!

In the evening we went out to try and find something to eat. Easier said than done as usual!! There were no peso places and everywhere we looked was really expensive and most of the things on the menu weren't available! As soon as you sit down anywhere they always offer Cuba Libres or Mojitos, which are the most expensive drinks you can get, and we were getting a bit fed up with it all so kept walking out of places!! Eventually we found somewhere that was quite nice, and even though I didn't get exactly what I ordered the food was actually really good!

But then, inevitably, the band came out of nowhere and started to play! And so of course they expected money from us! But at least they were doing something to earn the money I guess and they were OK so we gave them some! Whilst we were there a couple sat at the next table to us and it turned out the guy was sort of famous but we had no clue who he was! It turned out he was a magician! It also turned out that he knew someone in Barracoa where we were going the next day so went and called them and arranged for them to meet us at the bus station!!! He then decided to do some magic!! The card tricks were reasonably impressive but then he did this other trick and I could see what he was doing which he got a bit annoyed at, so we left!!

We then tried to sample some night life but it all went a bit wrong. Basically everyone was charging a ridiculous cover charge to get in and the music was crap and people kept hassling us so after checking out a few places we gave it up as a bad job!

Barracoa

We had heard lots of good things about this place, especially the food so were quite excited to be finally going there!! However, this place had been cut off from the rest of Cuba until about the 1960s I think, before then you could only access it by sea. So the people were a little bit, um, different from other Cubans that we had come across so far...!

As there was only one bus a day to Baracoa we had to miss breakfast at the hotel which was a bit of a shame as it was quite nice! As we had to pay for it anyway though they said they would make up a breakfast for us to take with us which we thought was quite nice of them, until we saw it! It was a cheese and ham roll (that had been sitting on the reception desk all night!) and a carton of juice - not really what I would expect for 5 CUCs but not really surprising!! When we got to Baracoa it started off well though, as usual we were met by someone at the bus station, and this woman was lovely - really friendly and just laughed all the way to her house! Then she told us that she only had one room so we would have to split up, which I didn't really want to do, so she went to her brother in law and fortunately he had a place with two rooms so we stayed there instead! We felt a bit bad for the woman as she had come all the way to meet us but she didn't seem to care and we were still staying with someone in the family so it all seemed OK!

The town seems quite nice, it has a bit of a different feel to it than all the other places but you don't get hassled too much which is good! And they sell peso pizzas and ice cream just down the road from our casa which is always a bonus!

We walked up to a posh hotel which overlooked the town and had a drink up there which was quite nice! They even had a pool up there - how the other half live eh?! To get up there though we had to climb up some steps and there was this local kid with no shoes on and his feet were all manky and bleeding and he wouldn't let us pass until we had given him money, which we didn't. But even though he claimed to be in pain, he could run very fast to the steps every time a tourist came along...!!!

We couldn't afford to have nice food two days in a row so we thought we would eat cheap the first night and then treat ourselves to the speciality meal of fish in coconut sauce the next! We eventually found a peso restaurant that did the normal fried chicken and rice etc etc so had some of that. We also got a beer, although there was no label on the bottle so I have no idea what it was but it tasted OK!! Whilst we were eating this woman who was clearly not right came and sat with us! She wanted some of our food but we wouldn't give it to her and I kept asking her to leave but she kept ignoring me, and no one in the restaurant would do anything either. So eventually we moved tables and as we did she picked up the chicken bone off my plate and started eating it! Then she got kicked out! But then she stayed outside the door and then every now and again kept coming in and sitting with other people. She also kept lifting her skirt up to show the men her undies. All the locals were just sitting there watching her and some were laughing, as if it were the evenings entertainment, it was really weird. Eventually she left though, only to be replaced by some other random person who was clearly not quite with it either, but after shaking our hands he was happy to leave us alone which was good! An English guy we kept bumping into was telling us earlier about a guy in the square who wasn't quite all there and ended up getting his bits out for everyone to see! The locals started hitting him with sticks and then an ambulance turned up, gave him a shot of something, he passed out and they took him off to recover. So there was an interesting mix of people in this town - cock man and fanny woman!!! Nice!

The next day we went for a walk round the outskirts of town, which was great as there was no hassle and it was really nice just to see people going about their business and not caring that we were there. Then in the afternoon we walked over to the river and watched these people push a car a little way into the water. I wondered what they were doing but it turned out they were just washing it!!!

Before dinner we decided to go for a little drink, and had finally got wise to people so when they offered us mojitos and cubre libres we declined them and asked for a small bottle of rum and a couple of cans of coke instead! Exactly the same as a cubre libre but cheaper! We were at la Casa de la Trova but ended up sitting out in the middle of the street, so it was our own fault really that we got hassled again by fanny woman and cock man and every other random person that walked past, and we actually saw cock man being hit with a stick by a local when he wouldn't leave us alone which we felt a bit bad about...

We went back for dinner, and it was the best meal we had in Cuba. There was salad and rice and then fish in a really lovely coconut sauce, it was fantastic. We hadn't had anything in a sauce for such a long time and it tasted sooo good!!! After this we were ready to hit the town! We decided that we would actually pay a cover charge to get in somewhere so we wouldn't get hassled all night! We went to a rooftop bar where they had a dance show thing which was quite good, although after a few more bottles of rum the night is a bit hazy!!! Every time I went to the bar I had a shopping list of things to buy - 1/2 bottle of rum, 2 cans of coke and a cup of ice! I kept going back for more ice and at one point the barman asked for a beso (kiss) before he would give me the ice but I said no!!!! I think we ended up getting a bit of hassle from a guy when we kept saying we didn't want to dance with him, so we ended up leaving and trotted off home!!

The next day we were feeling a bit worse for wear, so after a nice greasy peso pizza we hopped on the bus to Santiago and then caught the night bus back up to Havana.

Havana

We got to Havana the next afternoon and went to the casa where Tracy and Vivi had stayed previously. We tried to contact her to let her know I was coming too but couldn't quite work out the phones, so figured just turning up would be OK! It turned out none of could stay there the first night as she had other people staying but she had other places for us to stay which was fine. then without us even asking she said the three of us could stay in the same room (which is highly illegal!) which was cheaper for me so was great!

In the afternoon we went to Miramar, a posh part of Havana, and then walked back which took hours! Then we went wandering for a while around town, and tried to find something to eat but as usual everything was completely overpriced and expensive so we opted for a peso pizza instead (chorizo though, we've gone upmarket from the usual cheese!)

The next day we spent in and around Old Havana, went to the Revolution Museum which was really interesting and into some art galleries, that weren't really galleries, more like a little room with a few pictures or photographs on the wall! We also went into the Capitolio, which looks very similar to the Capitol Building in Washington, so it's pretty amazing but there wasn't really very much inside which was a bit disappointing. There was supposed to be a huge diamond in there somewhere which we spent ages looking for and couldn't find, only to find it in the main entrance as we left, so we had walked right past it on our way in! I had wondered why they had roped off a little bit of the floor and now I know why, as there's a huge great diamond in it! Not sure if it's real though or not...

In the evening we went to try and find some food again... We ended up in this place that was really crap, they didn't have anything on the menu except their meal of the day and it turned out to be tiny and not that nice! So after that we went to an ice cream place that we had seen and they didn't have much either so our ice cream turned out to be a complete disappointment too!! Eventually we ended up in a bar for a drink (with the obligatory band who took great interest in us until we refused to buy their CD, then they ignored us!) and people were eating food in there so we ended up ordering something in there too and then three attempts later we were finally full!!!!

The next day we ended up catching this little boat thing that had seen better days across to Casablanca. First we had to have our bag searched and then when we asked how much it was going to cost they said it was 10 cents each. So we showed our money and they kept saying no and said we needed half of that. This went on for about 10 minutes as we showed her all the change we had to see which coins were the right ones to use. Eventually a guy came up behind us and gave us the money to get on - they had been talking cubanos and we had been talking in CUCs! So 10 cents in cubanos was nothing, not even pennies I don't think, it was so cheap! It was so nice of them to not try and rip us off!

The boat was an interesting contraption, it was like a tugboat type thing and REALLY old! There was a lot of security and people with guns standing around as apparently a few years ago people had tried to hijack these boats and sail to Miami. I'm surprised they made them that far as they weren't in the best condition!!

Anyway, we got to Casablanca, found some half decent food (well a cheese and ham sandwich which they then charged a ridiculous amount for!) and then went walking. We walked up to a huge statue of JC, the big man himself, and as we had gone up a bit of an alternative route some guy came running over to us telling us we needed to pay to walk round the statue. Obviously as it's not as if anything is free in this country! We then walked for ages past the fort and over to the Castillo, where every night they fire a cannon and have some elaborate procession thing, probably for the benefit of the tourists!!! As we were standing there looking out to old Havana and the Malecón as the views were fantastic there was this kid standing behind us. I just assumed that he was going to try and start talking to us, which is what they usually do. I took a few photos and then turned around to see where he was and he was right behind me! He ducked round me and tried to steal my camera!! I'm not sure what happened, either he fumbled it or I scratched his hand and he dropped it and Vivi picked it up and he ran off!!! I couldn't believe it! After all this time of saying how safe I felt here, on the last day someone tries to nick something!!! I was a bit pissed off and a bit shocked as nothing like this had happened to me before. Am just glad he didn't manage to run off with it as it had a month's worth of photos on it! He clearly was just a kid and didn't know what he was doing, which was good for me!, but he could've got put in prison if he had been caught, so it was a pretty stupid thing for him to do really. Oh well, it all turned out OK in the end!

Went for a drink (where yet again they tried to overcharge us!) and watch the sun set over Havana. Then just as the sun was setting the mozzies came out in force - everyone was standing there swatting them and at one point I looked at my arm and had about 8 mozzies eating me, it was horrible!! So we hopped back on the boat to get back to Havana and away from the mozzies but the damage was already done and I was covered in bites!!

We went for a nice dinner seeing as it was our last night - we found a Greek style restaurant and the food was really good. Then we had just enough money left for one drink and then headed back home!

The next day, immigration paid a visit which was interesting! Apparently this woman is only licenced for one room but was renting out two. And then he started asking questions about me so we said I was staying at a hotel!! We were really worried that we had caused trouble but the family didn't seem overly concerned by it...

We walked to the Plaza de la Revolución, and they were starting to set up for the 1 Mayo celebrations which are supposed to be huge. Then we walked down to Coppelia as we figured we should at least have one of these famous ice creams before we leave. However, when we got there we found that there was a tourist section which charged 2.80CUC for 2 scoops, and a locals section which charged 5 cubanos for a scoop!!! This was outrageous and by far the most obvious over pricing for tourists I think we had seen!!! On principle we refused to buy an ice cream there, and instead settled for a 1/2 litre tub of Nestle which was a lot cheaper!!! Then we walked back to the casa, had our last peso pizza and, after saying all our goodbyes to the family we had stayed with, hopped in a taxi to the airport.

We did it! We managed to survive a month in Cuba, and yet still don't understand the country or the people or anything about the place really, and we did try!! I'm really glad I went though, I have no regrets, and there was only one day when everything got on top of me which I think it pretty good going for a country like that! It is one of the few countries though that I was ready to leave though, and was looking forward to getting back to civilisation and to somewhere where things can be achieved relatively easily!!!

Would I recommend Cuba? I think I would but with some caveats obviously! I wouldn't travel there alone, it is easy enough but as there are no hostels it is harder to meet people. Also you need a lot of patience and a lot of money, this isn't really a country for backpackers! And some Spanish would come in handy as a lot of families we stayed with didn't speak much, if any, English. But it was an experience and I always like a challenge!!