Havana, Cuba - Days 1 & 2

When we arrived in Havana, Cuba it was about midnight and every airport official was in an army uniform. It was a very strange airport, not a whole lot of security and in a lot of the rooms there were old men having a smoke on a cigar. By the time we passed the security checkpoints the carousel carrying our bags was getting loaded, most of the bags that came out on the carousel were balls of stuff (looked likely belongings we would put in a suitcase) wrapped in pillowcases and wrapped in a lot  of cling film and tape. Our bags were pretty far down the line and by the time we got out into the main terminal part with all the remises and taxis there wasn’t anyone looking to help us. Like Argentina, Cubans speak Espa~nol which helped when we found our way to the Information Desk, from there we got a taxi driver. At first we were worried because we now had four bags/suitcases but when the driver popped the boot of his 1950 Bel Air Chevrolet we saw we would have no problem. You heard right, just like you might have seen in photos Cuba is about 70% (if not more) old fashioned cars from the 40s, 50s and early 60s passed down from generation to generation. 

Once we’d got our money exchanged and paid the driver it was upstairs for a short sleep 1:30am – 6:45am on a fold out bed.  From our Saratoga Hotel room we had a view of Cuba’s Capitol and a few intersections below.

 In the morning we went to our tour, after half an hour of wandering we found it, and walked through the old part of Havana. 

On the walking tour we walked through 4 squares of significance, the first had a street that had been converted in to a wooden version of cobble stone by a rich old man so that his wife could sleep (the wife couldn’t sleep because of the loud sound the stone cobble stones made when the horse drawn carts ran over them).  In the center of the square was a statue dedicated to some old guy of importance (Sorry, it was a few days ago and I had like 6 hours of sleep, I forget.), 

In one of the corners was an old fort that the people used to use to fend of attackers, it was originally made of wood but due to a fire set by attacking pirates they decided to rebuild it out of stone.

 Possibly more importantly depending on your habits, in another one of the corners was the Havana Club store which sells Cuba’s famous cigars and rum. The cigars, like most I assume, went up in strength and price, first were the Romeo y (and) Juliets (No. 1 and No. 2) supposed to be the softest of the lot before it got into some serious, individually packaged cigars that obviously meant business.

We purchased some of these and stopped for a coconut fashioned by a man with a large machete.

Next after a short walking passing old drugstores and bodegas selling the people’s months rations (allocated on a per person basis) at a highly government discounted price.

 we reached the next few squares all of which had cafes and old buildings used by ministries. In my opinion the most interesting square was the last one we visited, there, we walked around some of the cafes and saw a dance troop on stilts dancing their way through the square and when we sat down an “artist” started to draw me and dad. 

After he’d done this he started asking us for money, it was pretty annoying, after he’d just walked up to us and drew us, obviously it was a scam or whatever but he was so persistent. In the end we didn’t pay him and he got all in a fuss stomping off disappointed. Once we’d visited the squares and walked through the old colourful streets we went to our tour guide’s friend’s house for lunch on his rooftop. 

There we had barbequed chicken, salad and a range of cocktails, it was great and we had wonderful panoramic views of the old rickety rooftops of the Cuban locals. It was a great lunch.

Once we’d had lunch, finishing off our walking tour we made our way down a few streets to where three old (1960s and earlier) cars were awaiting us (a group of about 10). One car was an open top baby blue coloured car looking like a Chevy or a Cadillac, another looked exactly like the “Pink Ladies” car from Grease and finally ours was a pimped out, purple 1950s Ford Model T, Land Rover type car (Open top of course like the others). Our car had a classic old fashioned horn and when the driver started up the car he used it freely which drew the attention of some surrounding tourists taking photos.

We drove for a while and then the funniest thing happened it started to rain. REALLY rain.  Like I have never seen before.  That’s when the clock started, it was a race to get the top on, the inside was already wet because of the amount of rain - like buckets pouring into the car.  But we didn’t care that much, it was so warm.

When we started driving again we made our way through town in the pouring rain, of course, to Revolution Square. By the time we’d parked up our car the rain had slowed to a drizzle which was great as we could take our time getting out and looking at the monuments in the square dedicated to Cuba’s revolution lead by Fidel Castro and Che Guevara. We (me) took some great photos in the square and just as we’d finished up it was again a race against time to get to the car as the rain picked up once more, inside the car was still wet but we still didn’t care, it was SUCH A COOL CAR! 

On our final voyage in the awesome cars we made our way through the pouring rain and river like puddles (as a side story: When we were driving along side the Ocean the wind inside the car picked up and Dad’s newly purchased Panamanian hat flew out the back of the car, gladly the car two cars behind us (also part of the tour) saw this, stopped and picked the hat up. A happy ending.) to the Hotel Nacionale where we said goodbye to our guide Sally and had a Pina Colada or two. The main attraction of the Hotel Nacionale is the fact that back in the 30s, 40s, 50s etc. when the mob was big in Cuba a lot of “mob bosses”  stayed there and had meetings there smoking their cigars, this caused a lot of movie stars, singers etc. to stay there.

Later in the night once we’d said goodbye to everyone in our tour we went back to the hotel, got changed and headed out for dinner in a restaurant called San Christobel Parador - A restaurant visited by Obama, the President of Cuba and a bunch of other famous people), The food was good and the people were nice, it was a good night. By this time the rain was still pouring down, the sky was acting like a fountain, every square inch was like a hose pouring down on us. The old cars were soaking wet inside and only a yellow taxi was watertight.  The waiters greeted us at the door with umbrellas and helped us avoid the floods and waterfalls from above.

After dinner we caught an old 1948 car back to the hotel where we went to sleep ready for a more relaxed day tomorrow.

The next day we got up (I missed breakfast.) and headed out to (via modern taxi) the Museo de Revolution.  It was a beautiful hot day as if yesterday afternoon never happened.  The Museum basically explained and displayed how the revolution took place and succeeded, this was all done of course through the bias perspective of the government. It talked about the Garrison attack in which Fidel Castro (With his brother Raul and some others) attempted to take over a Garrison and a Hospital inside the Garrison to spark the revolution. They went in the Garrison disguised as hospital patients and doctors/nurses etc. but the attack ended up failing, the attackers (Fidel etc.) got sent to prison for 15 years except! After one year they got exiled to Mexico where they met the other main figure in the Cuban Revolution: Che Guevara who was, at the time, a doctor. As part of the exhibit they had the real life bloodied soldiers uniforms and patient outfits of people who died in the attack backing the revolution, these people were of course hailed as war heroes.  

After walking through the exhibits, some of which straight up mislead the public and were offensive to Americans; 

We then moved on to the second part of the museum reserved for more “big ticket” items such as tanks, planes etc. the main item on display was the boat that Che Guevara and Fidel Castro used to cross from Mexico back to Cuba to restart the revolution. 

First some background, back in NZ I take History as a subject, last term (February – Midway through April) I studied, drum roll please, the Cuban Missile Crisis! So when I walked around the corner and saw the real remains of Rudolf Anderson’s U2 Spyplane that was shot down over Cuba and the same type of rocket that shot it down I couldn’t believe it! That was one of the main things that we studied in class, it was a highlight of our time in Cuba for me. 

After I’d had my Mind blown we walked to the front of the museum and into the oven of a sun.

From the museum we started our trek to get some lunch, after about ½ an hour give or take we found our restaurant close to the last square/plaza we visited yesterday. We had lunch at a café called (translated into English) “We are not a cafe”  

and moved on in the hunt for an indoor market by the seaside, on our way to this elusive market we ran into Sally our guide again which was cool as she had recommended the café we’d just came from (Good food by the way.). After wandering the streets of Havana we found the cool (literally and metaphorically) indoor market selling all types of things from big pieces of art to knick-knacks like magnets. At the market I got some Che Guevara hats and a Che Guevara top, I would call that rather successful. 

Once we’d looked thoroughly through the market we went outside looked across the road and there was possibly the best looking car in Havana, a Pink Chevrolet And were able to snag it as a taxi, after taking some cool photos with it 

we got back to the hotel and went up to the roof to chill out by the pool. 

From the hotel we went out to dinner to an old restaurant called Del Oriente which had a very good jazz band playing which let you give them song requests if you gave them a tip (10 CUC (Cuban Convertibles), in Cuba tourists get different money than the locals.). After giving them said 10CUCs we took some photos and asked them to play The Girl From Ipanema, they were such a good trio. After finishing our delicious dinner and dessert (My first ever Three Milk Cake was so good.) 

we headed back to the hotel for an early start the next morning. On the way back we saw Samba dancing in the square

Tomorrow (Today), I travel to Cancun which is only 1 hour flight away - until then, goodbye.

Joseph Hewson