Cuba travelog

(para los hispanohablantes podeis utiliizar http://babelfish.altavista.com/ si queren hacer una traducción)

Finally, after all those nights plowing away in the library and sleeping on the beanbags on level 2, I've found some time to write about my journey to Cuba. As a lot of people have asked me to tell them how it went, instead of sending out mass emails, I thought a blog with pictures and videos and stuff would be much more 21st century. So here goes. First off, to set the mood, here's a cuban song they played everywhere to accompany you whilst you have a look:

14th December 06

From Bristol, I grabbed easyjet to Madrid for the flight over, and stayed overnight with some random from www.couchsurfing.com The girl I stayed with turned to be a real lefty, and I ended up going to a meeting with all her other revolutionary pals where they discussed "islam, el marxismo y la revoluccion" or summit like that. Holy moly. I was way in over my head. Although it was a good test to see if I still remembered the lingo. And we had some proper tapas afterwards. yum.

The next day I met Harry (that's him on the right) at the airport and stood in a four hour queue, because all the cubans were trying to take waaay over the bagagge allwoance of 40 kgs and were arguing with the check in desk. I think this happens with every flight to Havana, they're always delayed. Anyway, we finally get to the front of the queue and the check in dude says "su visadas por favor?" and I nearly pooed my pants. I'd read in several places that although you can go through the hassle of aplpying for a tourist visa in advance, what usually happens is either the airline or the agency provide tourist cards to fill in on the plane. Harry was totally freaking out by this point. I was cool. as. a. cucumber. though. Totally in charge of the situation. We ran downstairs, found a random travel agency and practically leaped across the counter to grab our visas. So we made it. phew. yeeehah.

Touch down in Havana a couple hours late and we meet Ania, a Cuban lady I had prearranged by email to stay at her casa particular (there she is on the right). The deal was pretty sweet for central havana, only 20 convertibles a night between the two of us.  She's a bit of a property mongul who always seems to be recommended on the lonely planet forums ( http://thorntree.lonelyplanet.com ). That first night we went to check out the Malecon and eventually realised that the part close to us was a gay hang out spot. A bit of a suprise.

The following day me and harry scouted out the area (Havana Vieja, Vedado), I got my haircut, and we got hastled by the jiniteros (Cuban pimps) for the first time.

As we were walking down the prado, a bit like the ramblas from Barcelona, we stumbled across an impomptu flamenco class on the pavement. Pretty random:

In the evening we picked up the girls from the airport (Nuria and Tharesa), for which of course the flight was delayed as usual, and Tharesa's bag was lost, which resulted in her being in a strop for the next couple of days. Unfortunatly I couldnt find any pictures of her looking like a grumpy cow, although there was plenty of oppurtunity. Here's a picture on the right of Nuria looking like a pornstar instead.

After the girls settled in, we spent a couple of days in Havana chilling, visiting the monuments, celebrating harry's birthday in a poosh restaurant and going out to the malecon and the casa de la musica in the evening. Here are most of the pictures from Havana:

I also took one or two videos, one whilst the house band were playing in the bodeguita del medio and another when we were faffing around the cemitary.

After the hustle and bustle of Havana, we all decided with the Sanchez Clemente family that we wanted to chill out in the countryside. So we hired a mini bus and drove to Vinales, stayed at an awsome casa particular at Chichis (her business card is on the right) and went horseriding. We also met a guy in the local music venue who used to play with Irakere, Cuba's most famous jazz band. We arranged to meet up for a percussion lesson but the guy's car broke down or something from pinar del rio. bummer.

Here are all the picks of Vinales: