CUBA
Travel Director, Hattie Mills, on why Cuba is beautifully complicado
My flight arrived into Havana after dark and as I stood outside the retro façade of the José Martí international airport waiting for my ride with Miguel, the lights flickered, and everyone held their breath.
We drove into town with the windows down, savouring the warm breeze and the rumble of the American classic car engine. The highway was dark and empty and when we passed a petrol station, I could see a line of 20+ cars snaking around the block, drivers leaning against them, smoking as they waited for their turn at the pump.
On arrival in Old Havana I headed to the roofbar of the hotel, Elvira Mi Amor, for my first taste of Hemingway’s favourite cocktail, a daiquiri. I had a lot of questions about the island and had already glimpsed some of the difficulties Cubans face. Jorge the host and barman smiled ruefully and told me, es complicado.
This is a refrain I heard again and again during my stay. It is complicated. Every day I was fascinated and surprised, witnessed grandeur and decay. I found the people to be very open, wry and funny about life. Cuba is a country that tests your senses – and emotions – to the max.
Riding along the seafront in a classic car, it wasn’t hard to imagine the glory days of Havana when it was a playground for the rich and famous – gangsters, singers and spies of a bygone era – before political events took it in another direction completely.
Over the next few days and nights in the city, I visited Ernest Hemingway’s home on the coast, learned how to make mojitos, took salsa classes, sampled Cohiba cigars and marvelled at the enormous arts space housed in an old factory in Vedado. I also learnt that everyone has a ration book, that university professors earn $10 a month, and people lack basics such as toiletries.
Trinidad, where I was to spend a night, would provide an interesting point of comparison. Two hours to the southeast of the country, the sleepy, cobbled streets of this small town sit between the Escambray mountains, where rebellion troops once stationed themselves, and the Caribbean sea.
As we headed out of the city, cars were replaced by horse and carts on the road. We stopped to snorkel in the Bay of Pigs and ate lobster at a local paladar before continuing the journey. Like everything in Cuba, the roads are in need of some TLC and two hours stretched to five as we regularly slowed to avoid the potholes.
Driving along the coast, little crabs scuttled across the road in front of us and the lights were out as we drove into town. I stayed at Mansion Alameda, a gorgeous colonial house on one of the main cobbled streets, within walking distance to artists’ studios, picturesque plazas, café’s and bars. With a generator, they are able to keep the show on the road despite electricity shortages.
In Trinidad we hiked to a remote waterfall in the Topes de Collantes national park in the morning and in the afternoon headed to the coast to watch the sunset on Ancon beach. Life is slower here.
Our original plan was to return to Havana for our final night but as any Cuban knows, things don’t always go to plan and you have to adapt. Hurricane Oscar was due to land that night in Havana so we stayed for one more night in Trinidad. There was no power in the city, but after dinner, we weren’t quite ready to call it a night.
We wandered the streets until we came across an establishment that was still open (thank you generator!) and spent a magical evening dancing salsa with the waiters on the roof, sampling cocktails and listening to the city’s residents converse in the darkness below us.
In just seven days I experienced hurricanes, power cuts, hyperinflation, the black market, music, salsa, rum and regime. A far cry from everyday life. Frankly, it doesn’t get more thrilling and heady than that.
GOOD TO KNOW
- Gone are the days where the Kempinski was your only safe bet. Lots of gorgeous, privately owned boutiques are springing up around the country
- All good hotels have decent generators so blackouts don’t affect guests
- There are lots of privately owned corner shops now and you can buy most things (even Nutella, as one Cuban exclaimed) paying a little more
- Take USD cash, there are no cash machines and you can’t pay by card. You can pay in dollars and get change in Cuban Pesos when there
- Consider leaving toiletries, meds and clothes in Cuba when you leave
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