Crazy Cuba!

Relaxing in a hammock in my hostel in Cancun, Mexico, I begin talking to my fellow hammock-ers, Irina and Oskar about our travel plans.  This is back in December and I knew I was heading to Spain to meet the boy’s parents (I know, crazy!) but I still had 2 weeks before he returned to Central to join me travelling to do…something.  I didn’t want to stay in Cancun (as much as the hammocks were awesome) so I was thinking about what I could do to “waste” my time.  I was thinking out loud when I mentioned I’d love to check out Cuba.  Not surprisingly, Irina and Oskar also wanted to check out the country.  So….after knowing each other for only 24 hours, the next morning we were taken to a Cuban travel agent (thanks Hermes!) and we booked our tickets for less than 2 weeks later!! Woohoo!

We arrived in Cuba just in time to depart the year that was, 2014.  A year of incredible highs and lows for me, but most certainly a year that ended extremely well.  Cuba was the perfect way to top it off!  It was an incredible experience and a place I’d love to return to in the future to go and explore more.  It was interesting, extremely different, frustrating at times and very much patience draining (which you all know I have none of to start with!!).



The "supermarkets" in Cuba

So happy with our ice cream bowls! :)

We managed to eat 5 peso (20c) ice cream bowls (5 scoops with sauce and biscuits); drink 1 peso (4c) milkshakes; buy bottles of rum for $5 and catch local buses for 40c peso (under 2c).  We drank way too many home-made mojitos, met a lot of friendly locals who we are still in contact with and gained a particular skill for discovering peso restaurants to eat at!  We learnt there were “tourist” menus and “local” menus very quickly and so to ensure we paid in local prices, we managed to convince people we were living in Cuba.  This was achieved by Irina and I staying mute and letting Oskar (the only one who can talk Spanish properly) do all the talking!! Supermarkets in Cuba are for drunks and people who want to kill their lungs (as they only sold rum and cigarettes normally), so I guess for us they were perfect! J But seriously, it is the most difficult country I’ve ever travelled to, to find food from somewhere other than restaurants.  Irina and I got a lot of Cuban attention, one guy even asking to buy us from Oskar, which made walking around tiring at times.  But all in all the country is definitely somewhere that should be on everyone’s bucket list – just make sure you’re prepared for the culture shock!

Havana

We arrived into the capital, Havana, at night and were taken to our “hostel”.  As we pulled up outside a bland looking locked up building in a deserted street, we started to think our taxi driver was trying to scam us.  However, he was right.  Our hostel was actually a little apartment building where the rooms had bunk beds crammed in.  Very soon we realised that this was the closest to a hostel we’d find in Cuba. 


Expected view in Havana

 

Got my signature pic with Che Guevara

The next day we went exploring and while walking through the main “tourist” area of Havana near Parque Central and down Obispo Street, you see exactly what you imagine – fancy 1950’s cars, colourful buildings and lots of people.  But look to your left or right and you see the different side of Cuba, the broken streets, the beggers, the dirty garbage littering the sidewalks.  It’s a completely different world and opens your eyes to the hardship Cuban’s have been facing ever since the disconnect with arguably the world’s most powerful nation.  Talking to the locals, we met a doctor working for as little as $25 a month; taxi drivers that were qualified engineers or lawyers, just trying to make ends meet; a man looking after his disabled and elderly mother who requires full-time care, scrapping by on only 200 national pesos (approx. $8) a month for the 2 of them! It was eye-opening, heart breaking but also a little overwhelming and humbling to see how generous these people still were, when they literally had nothing. 
We spent NYE in our “hostel”, making our own mojitos (thanks to $5 bottles of Havana Club rum), while we waited for the antics to take off in Cuba (nothing begins until midnight on NYE).   Around 11pm we heading downstairs to join others from another hostel and continued drinking mojitos in the park across the street until we were herded up by our Cuban friend and loaded into a taxi to be taken to a festival of sorts.  However, it was basically a small amount of people in a very large area listening to techno music and we were not feeling the vibe.  Silly us, because after we left, we then spent the next 2 hours trying to find something lively in Havana to keep us entertained for the night, to no avail.  By 4am, we were tired and sobering up pretty quickly and so decided to call it a night.  Despite the taxi trek around town in the early morning, NYE was a pretty awesome start to 2015!

Getting ready to send off 2014!

Santa Clara

A couple of days later, we heading off to Santa Clara.  During a pit stop near Australia (I know, almost made it home!), we were sitting on the curb talking nonsense as normal, when we see our bus start leaving.  Running after it in a mad scurry, we managed not to be left behind in the middle of nowhere and continued on our journey!!  Arriving into Santa Clara, the atmosphere was just different.  It was a much more relaxed town, with less hassle from Cubans and a much more accepting culture.  This is the part of Cuba where transvestites are well known and is home to Cuba’s only drag show! We arrived on a Saturday hoping to catch a glimpse of this show, but turns out we were a week too late (only showing twice a month).  Despite that, we made friends with some locals, saw some very pretty trannies and even managed a picture or two!!  It was a refreshing change to see how accepting everyone was of each other’s choices.

So close to home!! Only 1km away

Picture with a trannie - Oskar was a little happppyyyy!

We spent 4 days in Santa Clara and had a ball! We managed to make friends with some Cubans; got to taste the worst Italian food any of us have ever tried (imagine lasagne with very little pasta or meat, instead just cheesy flour chucks); tried some incredible local food for as little as $2 for a 3 course meal; discovered Havaianas (when we couldn’t even buy milk!); were dubbed nicknames – mine being the “China girl”; and had a drunken midnight dinner with some Russians we met at the table next to us! We also drank too many homemade mojitos, where we ended up raiding the mint from our casa’s garden (we were given permission) and then in our drunken states decided to leave the limes and used mint in a pot plant, because you know, that makes them invisible! Our time in Santa Clara was definitely the highlight of the trip so far!

Trinidad

But then we arrived in Trinidad and I fell in love.  Most likely the most touristic part of Cuba but you can definitely see why.  Dubbed UNESCO protection in 2008, Trinidad is a town that has been preserved with the classic array of coloured buildings, beautiful galvanised steel windows and cobblestone streets.  The locals are friendly, the variety of food choices much more abundant here and there are many places to let your hair down and go dancing!

Beautiful streets of Trinidad

Our first night in Trinidad was lovely after meeting a bunch of new friends on the bus en-route.  So at dinner that night we had a very international group - one Danish, one Swedish, one German, one Argentinian, one Korean, two French and two Australians! After dinner we went and checked out Casa de la Musica where they have live music and a massive dance floor where locals and tourists alike can dance rumba, salsa or any other mix of hip-shaking! Was a lovely night!!



Our international dinner!

One of our favourite places was the “pina colada place” (as named by us), where they made incredible pina coladas for $2 for takeaway.  So we’d buy some and chill on the steps at the bottom of Casa de la Musica and listen to the music coming from above.  Here we also found the best street food of roast pulled pork buns with tomato – incredible! So delicious and fresh and only 10 pesos (40c)! But weird things do happen in Cuba – we bought ice cream in a cup but weren’t given spoons so walking down the street we were licking the ice cream out of the cup with our tongues – definitely got a few stares!

One of our days we biked to the beach from Trinidad (only 14kms away) but managed to find a beautiful secluded spot along the way where we could stop and swim and sunbake for a little while.  It was very beautiful.  The only strange thing we found, that I guess is going along with everything else we found in Cuba – there was no ice cream to be found at any shop at the beach! I think we’ve come to realise that what you would assume to be “expected” anywhere else in the world, in Cuba this can’t be assumed!

Biking fun out to the beach

The band at Casa de la Musica

Our last night together before trekking back for a short sleep in Havana and then leaving Cuba was spent again at Casa de la Musica.  We managed to buy a bottle of Havana Club and mixers for only $15 and so as you can imagine, we don’t really remember much!  There was a lot of falling over, water fights, breaking glasses, arguing with arrogant German guys, dancing salsa and eating too much food! It was a lovely way to end our trip together!

Thanks Irina and Oskar for an awesome start to 2015! Cuba was definitely an interesting adventure and I loved sharing it with you guys!

Keep checking back here for my next blog instalment specifically for backpackers – The Backpackers Guide to Cuba.

Until next time

xxx