Independent travellers to Cuba face a challenge in getting good information about planning their trip. The objective of this diary is to give practical advice to travellers, rather than describe the sights of the island, which are well described in guidebooks. My friend and I, both fit Canadians in our late thirties, spent two great weeks on the island in January 1998, visiting Havana, Pinar del Rio, Vinales, Maria La Gorda, Playa Larga, Trinidad, Playa Ancon and Varadero. We snorkelled, watched birds, saw the natural sights, and visited museums and architectural highlights in the cities.
We used two books to plan the trip: Carlos Soldevila’s Cuba (Ulysses, Montreal, 1997) and David Stanley’s Cuba: Travel Survival Kit (Lonely Planet, 1997). Both these books are very good. Soldevila is a little better at explaining the pseudo-underground economy, e.g. how much to pay a driver for long distance trips, or how much a private restaurant should charge, but Stanley’s better at describing the sights. The maps in Lonely Planet are much better than in Ulysses, and even better than the British Columbia Automobile Association road map we bought in Canada. Both writers are quite soft on the communist dictatorship, but really do seem to know Cuban society. In the following report, I often refer to the relevant page in Lonely Planet. In some ways this is a trouble-shooting guide, so it may sound like a list of complaints. It’s not. Cuba is a great place and I recommend it without hesitation or qualification.
N.B., all prices are in U.S. dollars.
GENERAL RECOMMENDATIONS
Getting Things Done
Getting things done in Cuba, especialy if your Spanish is as weak as mine and you’re doing things “officially”, can be a bit frustrating. Although most Cubans don’t speak a foreign language, in a crowd one will usually find at least one person who speaks English, French, or German with some facility. There are tons of U.S., Canadian, and French tourists, but not many Germans, so the German angle surprised me. I think that in the good old days of global communism, some Cuban youths may have gone to study in East Germany. What a jolly time that must have been!
Many services promote themselves as being open twenty-four hours a day. The somewhat disturbing aspect of this is that many Cubans in the tourist industry work twenty-four hour shifts, and then get two days off. We found this at tourist offices, car rental offices, and hotel desks. The shift changes at 8:00 in the morning, so that’s probably when you’ll find the person most alert and helpful. As the day turns into night and through to morning, these folks turn into the living dead, and their hollow eyes promise no succour. As well, if you’ve arranged for something the next day, the hand-over of information might not take place effectively, so you might want to show up for the shift change to check things out.
Accommodation
Wherever possible, stay in private residences (casas particulares) rather than hotels. The hotels we saw were overpriced, are poorly maintained, and have scant regard for customer service. When you buy your airplane ticket, it’s probably best to reserve one night in a hotel so you don’t have to look for a place when you land, but find a private home the next day. Similarly, eat in private restaurants (paladares) rather than official restaurants. Don’t be afraid to ask official workers, e.g people from Rumbos who work in hotel lobbies, to direct you to private residences. (They probably get paid more in commission from private operators than from their government salaries). Since you probably won’t have a reservation for a casa particulare, arrive at your destination before dark, so you don’t get lost looking for a place.
Wherever you go, I would recommend bringing your own sink-plug. We only stayed in one place that had one, and it was missing the plunger on top of the sink to move it up and down! As well, Cuban hot water equals marginally lukewarm water in other countries. Hotel employees will swear to Marx and Lenin that hot water is only another five minutes down the pipe, but this is a fiction. In a private residence one can at least boil water on the stove for shaving.
For Vancouverites: make any hotel reservations at the same time as you purchase your airplane tickets. Most Canadians go on package tours, and the travel agents here were absolutely hopeless at arranging anything else for us. They sold us tickets on a charter flight, but then said they couldn’t reserve hotel rooms directly. Horizontes Hoteles has a good website promoting its hotels and the flexi fly and drive program, but I don’t think the website has anything to do with the real world. I e-mailed them and got no response. No travel agent could help me with them. I finally tracked down the company’s rep in Montreal who advised me not to pursue the flexi fly and drive program, but he faxed the Horizontes Hotel Colina in Havana to get us a reservation and never got a response. I gave up on Horizontes, but I believe their marketing program in other countries may be better than in Canada.
Getting Around
Hitchhiking or renting a private car (particulare) are valid and economical travel options. However, some people we spoke to who had used private cars for travelling long distances found that the cars were uncomfortable and/or that the exhaust fumes were killing them. Also, most particulares don’t have seat belts. They are usally pre-1960 American cars or Soviet-bloc buggies such as Ladas.
If renting a car officially, arrange before leaving home. Rental car for tourists are provided by government monopoly, therefore undersupplied and overpriced, so you may have trouble finding a car once you arrive, or have to rent a top-of-the-line one. Again, we had trouble finding a Canadian travel agent who would help us rent a car, so I suggest you start working on this quite early. When we were in Havana, tourists were actually bribing the rent-a-car employees to jump to the head of the queue.
We did not have to bribe anyone, but rented a car for ten days from Havanautos, and got no discount for the term. Rates off-season may be better, but we paid a daily rate of $63 plus $18 for insurance for a Daiwoo Cielo, a Korean knock-off of a real four-door sedan. It functioned well, and the air-conditioning worked, but did not have true power steering, central locking or power windows. (I’m sure it sounds like I’m whining, but for $81 per day.....!) Because we wanted to leave the car at a different location, we paid a drop-off fee of $15. Unlike in Canada, where one is expected to return the car full of petrol, we were charged an extra $43 for a full tank and told to return the car empty. Of course, if the car is returned with the tank partially filled, there is no credit! So, do not fill up on the last day of your rental!
In our contract, we agreed to use only the premium gas, which cost 90 cents per litre. Regular gas was available at some Servi-Cupet stations for 75 cents, and I don’t know how they’d catch a cheater. We had no problem using a credit card at the stations, but a passport was also required and it took a few minutes longer than one would expect back home. We generally parked where we saw other tourist vehicles and ignored people who tried to get us to pay for car washing or guarding. One trick these fellows use is to pull your windshield wipers up (without asking permission) and expect payment when you return to your car, claiming they’ve washed the windshield. We just put the blades down and drove off, avoiding eye-contact. We suffered no vandalism.
For your flight home, note that the airport departure tax has been increased to $20.
HAVANA
Accommodation
We had tried to make a reservation at the Horizontes Hotel Colina (L.P. p. 159), but had not received confirmation. The desk clerks there had never heard of us, couldn’t recommend another hotel, and couldn’t have cared less. We ended up at the Cubatur office below the Habana Libre Hotel (L.P. p. 159). If you are in a fix and need a solution desperately, this is the place to go. Cubaturs is the most powerful travel agency and can get rooms where others cannot (sounds crazy but it’s true). They sent us to the Hotel Presidente (L.P. p. 159) at $72 for a double. The only thing good about this hotel is its lobby. The place was built in 1928 and the mildew dates from that era. The hot water was not, the bathroom always had at least one cockroach, and the desk staff were always in a state of confusion. We had a room with twin beds and wanted to move to a room with a double bed. Every day we asked to switch rooms, and they always said that they had to wait to see who checked out that afternoon. It was as if they didn’t know who was planning to check out, and they certainly weren’t going to take note of our wish and use their initiative to move us when a room became available! Breakfast was tolerable ($5 per person extra). The tenth floor bar is closed, as the top three floors are now (it was claimed) being used by businesses. The elevator stopped at the 7th floor, so what’s really going on up there is a mystery.
Other people we met were not very thrilled with their hotels either. Two private residences that we heard were good are: Nancy at 555 Calle 27 at D, tel. 32-1266; and Tatiana and Israel at 110 Calle Linea between L and M, tel. 32-5438.
Restaurants
The best restaurant we went to in Havana is in neither of the guide books. Restaurante Yi-Yo, at Calle L at the corner of 21st, kitty corner to a Servi-Cupet gas station, is in the second floor of an apartment building. It’s run by an architect and her brother, a retired medical researcher. Dinner cost $11 for two, but because it was a peso restaurant we had to do some funny business to pay our bill. The menu was in pesos, and we were told to convert to dollars by dividing by 23. We then made a black market purchase of pesos from the brother for the required amount. When it came time for the bill, we paid in pesos. We were told that as of January 1, 1998, they would no longer have to go through this nonsense, because the government was going to start taxing them in dollars rather than pesos, so they could start charging dollars directly. Also good for dinner was the Restaurante Bon Appetit (L.P. p. 162) at $15 for two, with beer. The stewed chicken was great. Restaurante Los Amigos (Ulysses) was very good, but a bit expensive ($23 for two with beer).
For lunch, the Bar Monseratte (Ulysses) was good ($10 for two with beer). The Cafeteria Bateria del Sol (L.P. p. 184) in the El Morro fortress was also good ($12 for two with beer). I wouldn’t recommend Don Agamemnon (L.P. p. 162). The waiter tried to sell us $25 lobster that was not on the menu. When we opted for $5 meals from the menu, the service slowed down drastically. The meal itself was acceptable.
Getting Around
We actually flew to Varadero on a 6:00 a.m. flight from Ottawa, with a crew that wanted so much to get us in the mood that they served us pina coladas immediately after take-off. We were the only two on the flight that were not on a package tour in Varadero, so had to figure out how to get to Havana directly on our own. A Cubatur man at the arrivals lounge charged us $25 each for a bus to our Havana hotel. There were only four passengers on the bus, and the man never gave us a receipt or ticket, so he may have just pocketed the money. No matter, we got to our hotel in just over two hours.
Within Havana it cost $3 for both of us to go from the Hotel Presidente to Havana Vieja by private car. I asked around, so I’m fairly sure this was the lowest price. Tourist taxis were no different for these short trips. We used a tourist taxi from the Hotel Presidente to the Hotel Havana Libre and it cost $1.60. I paid the driver $2 and she made no move to give me change. We couldn’t get private cars right outside the hotels, because of the police, but half a block away it was no problem. Pedicabs are also fun for short trips, but we had to solicit them. I think they usually just take locals.
The best deal for travelling in Havana is the new "Vaiven" tourist bus, not mentioned in either guide. The bus travels between Miramar and the fortresses of Havana Este continuously throughout the day and the 23 bus stops are clearly marked. For $4 you can get on and off the bus as many times as you want, or just sit there and enjoy the ride. As well as the driver, there’s a ticket collector who gives a bit of drive-by commentary in whatever language you want. The bus runs until 9:00 p.m. The buses and bus-stops are yellow and easily identified on the street. Buy tickets from Rumbos, who have agents working in most hotel lobbies.
Walking around was very easy and safe. Other than Linea and Calzado, the streets in Vedado are numbered or lettered. In some areas odd-numbered streets are perpendicular to even-numbered ones. It’s very easy to find your way around with the map in the Lonely Planet guide. There are no street signs on posts or buildings in Vedado. Look towards the ground at intersections for stone markers about 10 inches high with the street names carved into them (photo below). They can be read quite well, even at night.
PINAR DEL RIO
Accommodation
Cabanas Aguas Claras (L.P. p. 211, photo below) charged us $24 for a double. The place has a funky kind of beauty. The pool is great and so are the trees and pond on the property. When we were there almost half of the guests were Cubans. This meant that loud music was playing most of the night. When the music stopped, the night was filled with the sounds of local wildlife. Of course, the dominant local wildlife are dogs and roosters!
Another problem at Aguas Claras was the mosquitoes. Most Cuban residences do not have windows or screens, but wooden slats that open and close horizontally, sort of like very wide venetian blinds. Unfortunately, in our room (no. 50), the slats did not close completely, so we could barely sleep due to the continuous assault. If you stay there, check this out before you take a room. Aguas Claras was the only place I went to in Cuba that had hot water. This was done via a gadget called a Laser attached to the shower-head which heated the water to almost boiling and reduced it to a trickle. I imagined I was in hell, being peed on by the devil himself. I tried to disconnect the Laser but couldn’t.
We also arranged horseback riding at Aguas Claras. Unfortunately, our booking was lost in the 24-hour shift hand-over, so we had to wait an extra day. We were glad we did: the riding was great fun. Miguel was our caballero (photo below).
Restaurants
The restaurant at Aguas Claras was satisfactory for dinner ($14 for two without beer), but there were no eggs or bread for breakfast, which is pretty astonishing as the place is over-run with chickens. Maybe the management offended someone in the distribution system? Ask at the poolside bar for the local beer called La Princessa. It came in an unlabelled bottle for 85 cents, and was better than the national brands. They don’t sell it in the restaurant, which is all of 100 metres away, so buy a couple of bottles to bring to dinner.
We went to the Hotel Globo (L.P. p. 210), and asked for a lunch recommendation. A hotel employee took us to Casa Don Miguel (L.P. p. 211), which was very busy with tourists. We spoke to Don Miguel, who gave us the impression that he was a pretty big wheel in local business circles, having more than one restaurant. We ate on the second floor patio. The meal was very good ($19 for two with beer), but too much food for two people. I think he might price according to how much he thinks you can pay. The hotel employee loafed around for the duration of the meal, and escorted us back to our car, but didn’t appear to expect us to tip him.
Restaurante El Meson (L.P. p. 211) now has a menu priced in dollars. Our lunch there was very good, but a loafer outside tried to get us to pay him for watching our car. A local told us to ignore him, so we did.
Getting Around
Pinar del Rio was the worst town we encountered for hustlers. A gang of youths, on foot and on bicycles, swarmed around our rented car as we entered town from the Havana autopista. They were pointing and shouting to indicate things like the door being open or the tire flat, in the hope of getting us to stop so they could sell something. We just leaned on the horn and accelerated, but they didn’t give up easily. Drive carefully in Pinar del Rio, or you’ll run over some hustler on a bike weaving in front of you, waving someone’s business card!
VINALES
Accommodation
Paladars and casas particulares did have signs up in Vinales. We went to Restaurante Valle-Var (L.P. p. 216) and asked for a place to stay. We were introduced to Jose Antonio Lopez Camargo and his cousin Juan, who had a whole house to rent out at 23 Calle Salvador Cisneros. They had three rooms at $20 per night, but we were the only ones there that night. The men do not live there, so ask at the restaurant for them. They speak no English or French, and are absulutely wonderful fellows. Another cousin, who speaks English, uses the house as a pseudo-paladar, so you can eat there if you want. If you don’t, expect to see other tourists eating at the house, with a young woman cooking up a storm in the kitchen. By 9:00 p.m. they were gone without a trace.
We also looked at Hotel Las Jazmines (L.P. p. 216, photo below), of the Horizontes chain which had raised its rate to $54 for a double.
Restaurants
We had a very good dinner at Restaurant Valle-Var. We ate on the patio, and there was a trio of musicians playing inside. For breakfast, the patio at Hotel La Ermita (L.P. p. 216), a Horizontes hotel was unbeatable for $5 a head. The morning view of the mountains was superb.
SAN DIEGO DE LOS BANOS
Restaurants
We had an okay meal ($17 for two with beer) at the restaurant at the Hotel Mirador (L.P. p. 218).
PENINSULA GUANACABIBES
Accommodation and Restaurant
Theres’s only one place: Hotel Maria La Gorda (L.P. p. 214), and it is wonderful. Quite small and personal, it really is a scuba mecca. Most tourists are French here, and the dive instructors speak very good French, and some English. If you just want to rent snorkelling equipment ($5 per day), you can see fabulous fish starting right at the end of the dock. There’s fresh fish for dinner every night. We stayed there three days and it cost us $30 per night for the room, $10 for the permit to enter the peninsula, and $55 for all our meals. (We didn’t pay for the first night’s dinner because my girlfriend got food poisoning that kept her up all night. She thinks it was from mayonnaise in one of the salads.)
Getting Around
Staying on the right route from Pinar del Rio is quite difficult. There are more roads than shown on the Lonely Planet map (p. 206). I recommend picking up hitch-hikers who can give directions. There is now a real military checkpoint and gate at the La Bajada entrance. We just told the young soldier that we had reservations at Maria La Gorda and he cheerfully let us through after checking our passports in the office for a few minutes. We stayed in the car. When leaving the peninsula, we drove through the gate without being asked to stop.
PLAYA LARGA
Accommodation and Restaurant
Despite the negative review in Lonely Planet, we stayed at Villa Playa Larga (L.P. p. 255), because we figured that it would be the easiest for arranging a bird-watching tour. This proved to be the case. The hotel is now managed by the infamous Horizontes, so we were expecting the worst. We paid $34 for a cabana with double bed, kick-butt air-conditioning, and the usual lukewarm water, which is good value compared to other official hotels. There were a couple of security guards patrolling the place and we paid them $1 to guard the car. There was no problem with beach boys on the property.
The restaurant in the hotel was pretty grim. Chicken and a leathery minute steak cost $16 with beer, but the breakfast was okay. There was also an outdoor bar where a dreadful variety spectacle took place in the evening. It comprised a perfectly good band, smothered by an obnoxious M.C. and recorded disco music.
TRINIDAD
Accommodation
Motel La Ronda (L.P. p. 282) has reopened with fifteen rooms. Unfortunately, it was full, so all we saw was a very nice lobby. We were told that Hotel Ancon (L.P. p. 286) had a double for $58, but we opted to skip this monument to industrial tourism and stayed in a private home in the village of La Boca, which is not written about in Lonely Planet, but is on the map on p. 285. We got a room for $18 per night at Elsa Hernandez Monteagado’s house, no. 5 Avenida del Mar, tel.: 3236. The room was air-conditioned and very nice. She also stuffed us full of lobster, shrimp, and fish. Two dinners and one breakfast cost an extra $36 for both of us. It was a great deal, and Elsa is a wonderful lady who keeps her husband in the kitchen and runs a tight ship. Although Ulysses claims that casas particulares are illegal in Trinidad, Elsa said she had another house in the city available to guests. The house two doors towards the sea from Elsa also had signs advertising rooms for rent, but we did not check it out.
Restaurants
We ate dinner at Elsa’s, but had a very nice, huge lunch in Trinidad at La Coruna, on Calle Marti ($20 for two with beer). Calle Marti looked to have a number of nice paladares. We also had a buffet breakfast at Hotel Ancon for $4 a head. The food was okay, but the environment awful. The restaurant was full of package tourists with plastic wristbands. I was glad we hadn’t stayed there.
Getting Around
Trinidad has mostly one way streets, and the signs cannot be read in the dark. Parking looked difficult, so we just parked in the lot at the Motel Las Cuevas (L.P. p. 283) and strolled through town. The security guard looked at us a bit queerly when we came back at the end of the day and drove off, but we weren’t bothered. Walking around was great. Although Ulysses calls Trinidad Cuba’s begging capital, we saw virtually none. Perhaps there’s been a crackdown: when we walked around the Playa Mayor (L.P. p. 281), there were always two to four cops patrolling.
The drive from Trinidad through Topes de Collantes to Manicaragua (L.P. p. 288) is quite easy to find and is beautiful. There’s a mirador a few of kilometres south of Topes de Collantes where you can buy glasses of rum-spiked sugar cane juice and enjoy the birds flying around.
VARADERO
Accommodation
There was a crackdown on casas particulares in Varadero when we were there. One Cuban I approached declined to escort me to one because of the police presence. I was shown a smelly, dank, room with twin beds shoved together at the Horizontes Hotel Caribeano on Calle 1 near the corner of 30th for $47. We decided to spend $52 (including breakfast) for the Hotel Dos Mares (L.P. p. 241). The room was nice, with the traditional Soviet tank model air-conditioner, and a shower curtain that stopped almost a foot above ground-level (resulting in a flooded bathroom floor). Hot water was promised, but, as usual, there was none. This being our last night in Cuba, I decided to see if anything could be done. The reception desk sent a man up to the room who held his hand under the tap for five minutes before mumbling: “problem..... tomorrow.....”, and rushing out the door. I went to the reception desk to ask for an interpretation of this statement, and the clerk said that the problem would be fixed tomorrow. I told her I was leaving the next day so that wouldn’t do me any good. Pushing my luck, I asked her for a partial refund. She looked at me like I’d grown a second head. Two of them consulted for a few minutes and asked me to return later. When I checked out the next morning I followed up with the new clerk. The problem had not been reported to him. I gave up, realising that the operation of this hotel was not going to be disturbed by the whims of its guests.
Restaurants
We ate one satisfactory meal at Dante ($26 for two with beer) in Parque Josone (L.P. p. 245). It was no different than a standard Italian restaurant in Vancouver or anywhere else, except more expensive!
ENJOY YOUR TRIP! More photos and links below.....
Alisson's Cuba Travel Guide has lots of trip reports and more.
Like it colder? Judy & I also went to the Chilkoot Trail in Alaska, British Columbia and the Yukon.
I also went sailing in Croatia.
