Havana - cars, cigars, chocolates and crafts

For our remaining three days in Havana, we reverted to wandering the streets and sitting in cafes.  For us, the charm of Havana is not in the museums, but rather in walking along and seeing the crumbling but still beautiful buildings, the falling apart but fabulous cars and the times-gone-by but still trading counter shops.


Vintage they may be, but most at least are still vibrant in their way.

The evidence of a once very wealthy society is all around, and it is fascinating, sad and yet oddly reassuring to see how little those symbols of wealth have  been so little cared for over time.

I am very glad that they are now working to preserve the architecture that is here but the reality is, had the country continued to develop and build during these post revolution years, many of these lovely building would be long since gone.

Similarly had there not been restrictions on the import and sale of vehicles, Cuba would not have the many Cadillacs, Pontiacs and other vintage cars that we see today.  We were concerned that with restrictions being relaxed, these old cars would be sold to dealers from the States and Europe and replaced by the more efficient but soulless new cars.

Happily, we heard that the UNESCO status recognises that these cars are a part of Cuba's heritage now, and protects them as well as the buildings.

But even we couldn't resist one museum - the museum of chocolate!  Not that it is really a museum.  It is really a cafe and shop,  where you can watch them make the chocolates and see a few cabinets with old chocolate moulds and other paraphanalia.  But the chocolate was quite tasty, so we weren't complaining.

Then of course even as non smokers like us, you can't come to Cuba without visiting a cigar factory.  We had tried the one in Santa Clara, but that was no longer doing tours, so we figured we'd go to the one here.  Except that was closed too.

But at least here there was a lady sat at a workstation in the corner of the shop making the cigars for the benefit of we tourists.  So we did get to see the process and it didn't cost us anything.

We also made it to the Almacenes de San Jose craft market where we spent some hours looking around at the multitude of paintings of old cars.  These are of course slightly kitsch, but I do like them, and we spent some time considering them before finally deciding we don't currently have any walls, and by the time we do again, we will have far too many pictures and photos for this one to get put up.  So instead, I bought a colorful paper mâché boot and Nic bought a Che Guevara wallet, partly because he needed a wallet, and partly because he liked the irony of it.
 

Beyond that we spent some time in a few bars and restaurants, often with a few rum based drinks and some (usually welcome) musical entertainment. Three places that didn't have any live music, but which we rather liked were La Imprenta, Palador Doña Blanquita and El Chanchullero.

The first, La Imprenta, was a state run restaurant, which was something of a surprise as unlike most, it was really rather slick.  The food was great, they had some good wines, it was good value and the service was impeccable, but the more remarkable thing was the design.  It was an old print works building, and the decor was built around that.  The seats and tables were all carved wooden typeset letters, there were old bits of printing machinery, and many other interesting, slightly unusual, and yet still tasteful touches.  Something of a surprise really.

The second , Palador Doña Blanquita, was not state run, but rather a small restaurant on the second floor of an anonymous looking building.  The food was good, and there was a nice view across the Prado, but what amused us here was that this is so clearly  a place that someone has opened where they live.  We could tell this because at the room at the back we could clearly see the old mum asleep on the sofa.

And the last, El Chanchullero, was a lovely but tiny little bar on Plaza del Christo.  It made great cocktails and although we didn't eat here the food did look good.  But the interesting element for us was that it was very different to what we had come to expect in Cuba.  It had excellent quirky decoration, including a tiny shrine inside and was very simple and cosy.  It was the sort of place that would have gone into whatever city we were in.

Perhaps it seems wrong that some of the places that appeal to us are those that are less traditional.  We do like to go to the traditional places, but we quite like to see what is new about a place as well.

Sometimes as a tourist it can feel like all of the traditional things are a bit false - done for the tourist market rather than because it is what they would still choose to do.

They are still interesting and can tell you a lot about a place's past, but we like to mix in a bit of the more modern culture too, and perhaps get to learn a bit about where the country and it's people are going rather than just where they have already been.

Havana - and the second old car

The next afternoon the four of us hired one of the big old open top Cadillacs for a drive around the city. This car was in somewhat better shape than last nights, although Russell had for some reason picked a bright pink one!

We drove around the old town, seeing as we passed the old churches, the tree that tradition says people have to walk around on a particular day for luck, and the old town fortifications.

We drove along the Malecon and watched people getting wet as the waves splashed over the sea wall onto the pavement. It seemed to be part of the walk to get wet - perhaps because it is hot no one cares about a quick soaking.

Our first stop was the Hotel Nacional, which was USA built in the 1920s with art deco and arabic influences, and was tremendously popular as a casino and hangout for the rich and famous.  The Mafia bosses used this place for meetings.

After the revolution, the US management left and the hotel was state run.  This is one of the few places that you can see any kind of tribute to Fidel Castro as there is a display of pictures in the lobby here. It is interesting as most longstanding unelected leaders have statues of themselves everywhere, but Fidel has none of that. There is one plaque on a wall in Havana which celebrates him but that is it, and even that is small, understated and on a corner of a building.

We stopped for a while in the Plaza de la Revolucion, which is a huge (72,000 square metre) square that is surrounded by state buildings including the office that was Fidel's and is now used by his brother Raul. This is where the big parades happen. The main structure is a 109 metre high monument to Jose Marti, with rather dwarfs the 18 metre statue of him.

Two of the buildings have large faces on them. One is the Ministry of Communications building with the face of Camilo Cienfuegos, the other is the Ministry of the Interior building with Che Guevara. We had half expected that taking photos wouldn't be allowed, but in fact there was no problem at all.

We drove through a leafy area full of big old buildings, one of which was the British Embassy.  It looked quite impressive, but we were amused to see that it was next door to that of North Korea.  Not something that would happen in most countries.

Of course one country that does not have an embassy here is the USA.  But we were surprised to see that it does still have a presence in the form of the United States Interests Section.  But just in case the US should start to feel too comfortable here, Fidel Castro has created the huge Plaza de la Dignidad next to it with a large anti-imperialist stage where the columns bear the names of revolutionary heroes and North Americans who fight for social reform.  About five years ago, around seventy huge flagpoles were erected right in front of the building to hide the anti castro propaganda that President Bush in his usual diplomatic way, was issuing from there.  President Obama stopped it, but the flags remain.

Our last stop was rather less grand. The John Lennon park is small and leafy, with is a wooden bench where you can sit down next to a bronze John for a photo or a rather one sided chat if you feel so inclined. The writing on the ground is the Spanish of 'You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one.'

The cadillac trip is a very touristy thing to do, but it was a bit of fun, and with four of us, the price isn't too bad.

After the trip we stopped off at the Hotel Park View and had some of their excellent small plate food and lovely cocktails. The hotel isn't cheap, but the food and drink in the ornate lobby is reasonably priced and very good. They also have a decent wifi connection - though you do have to pay for it.

Appetites satisfied, we went to a nice bar that Nic and I had found the day before. The Monserrate is a fairly small and understated bar, but the drinks are good and they have excellent live music all evening. Another good evening.

Havana - and the first of two old cars

For our first two nights in Havana we met up with a couple of friends who are currently living and working just a short hop away on the Cayman Islands. They were staying around the old town so as our original plan to meet them at our conveniently located hotel had failed, we met them in Plaza Vieja instead.

We spotted a vacant outside table at the microbrewery called Taberna de Muralle, and grabbed it. With a nice view, a tower of reasonable locally brewed beer and some good music playing, we stayed to eat there and caught up on each others news.

After food we wandered around the streets nearby in search of a bar. We intended to try out Bodeguita del Medio, which was an old Ernest Hemmingway haunt and full of character, but unfortunately it was also very full of people already. But we found an alternative after a while and sat outside drinking our various drinks, most of which contained rum of some form or other.

At the end of the evening, as we needed a cab back to our distant hotel, we headed to the square where we were told the drivers loiter. We were soon offered a cab at the right price, and we followed the guy over to the cabs. He took us to one of the old style cars, where the driver promptly sought a high price because it was a vintage car. He didn't seem too bothered when we said no; we just wanted to get where we were going and didn't care what the car was.

And this car wasn't so much vintage as clapped out. It is hot enough in Cuba that you generally want the windows open, which was just as well in this car as there was no glass in the windows to close. The interior of the car was exactly that - the inside of the metal outside. The seat was there, but otherwise here was no upholstery inside, just the metal panels, with bits of wire to open the doors.

Half way there we reached a point where the road sloped upwards and came to an abrupt stop. The driver tried to restart with no joy, so got out and had a fiddle under the bonnet and tried again; still no luck. Two attempts later he got it going; we held our breath for the rest of the journey and when we made it there I think we all breathed a sigh of relief.

Havana - with no place to stay

From Santa Clara we made our final bus journey back to Havana. We had decided that for these last five nights we would treat ourselves to one of the not too pricey, but nice colonial hotels in the older part of the city.

We arrived on the bus and the driver offered to arrange a taxi to the hotel, which we agreed to. The 'taxi' turned out to be two plastic chairs strapped into the back of the mini van that was taking the post sacks from the bus to the sorting office. It looked like something out of a movie where we would be forced in at gunpoint and gagged until they found somewhere suitable to shoot us and dump our bodies! Thankfully nothing like that happened, and we arrived safely at our hotel.

Though as we were about to find out, it wasn't our hotel at all. We had booked through Hostelbookers, which we had used quite a lot in South America, and though that agency had sent us confirmation and taken our deposit, apparently the hotel itself doesn't work with them, and had no reservation for us. They also had no rooms available, so we couldn't stay there.

Of course by this time the Hostelbookers office was closed, so we couldn't contact them, and had to find somewhere to stay. That was not going to be easy, as we had reached tourist season, and places were full. With hard to find and interminably slow Internet, there was no way we were going to quickly find somewhere else, so after a few phone calls that came to nothing, we turned to the tour agent sat in the lobby.

She didn't look too optimistic either. She first found a very expensive place, which we weren't prepared to pay for. She phoned a few that we said we would be happy with but with no luck. Then she found us a place way out in the Miramar area that could do the first four nights. The price was OK, even though annoyingly we were paying for included dinners which we knew we would not use more than one night, so we agreed.

We left a message at the front desk for the friends that we were supposed to be meeting there later in case we couldn't contact them beforehand, and set off for the new hotel.

The hotel was OK, but is was definitely a resort style hotel, where many people don't really bother to leave the hotel area for the whole of their stay unless it is for an arranged tour. We have nothing against that, but it just doesn't suit us, so we never stay usually at these places.

But it was somewhere to stay, and we left the other guests to their morning poolside dancercise classes and went into town instead. We did eat there one night and the food was fine, but generally we ate in town.

Once we finally got access to Internet, we booked our last night at a hotel along the Malecon. It was quite cheap, and once we got there we knew why. The room was OK and was clean, but the lift took forever (and we were on the eleventh and top floor), the balcony door was held together with a screw and a prayer, and when we arrived the water wasn't working - though by the time we returned that evening it was fine.

The water problem in our room may have had some connection with a water problem in the lobby, where there was rather too much of it! Multiple buckets and other containers were catching the drips - or not. There was water everywhere, and it stayed like that until we left the next day. It wasn't even as if we'd had a lot of rain.

As for Hostelbookers, this is the third time that somewhere we booked through them has been a problem. You can't contact anyone at the time there is a problem and their site doesn't let you access accommodation for the same day, so when it goes wrong you're stuck and all they ever do is say sorry and refund the deposit. So we will in future be using Hostelworld instead, which we have never yet had a problem with.

Our first day in Cuba

The reason that we came to Cuba now, was that we had seen that Fidel Castro  passed power to his brother Raul Castro, and that Raul had been indicating that he would relax some of the restrictions on the country.  As Obama has also been making conciliatory gestures towards Cuba, we wanted to get here before any changes started to have a noticeable impact.

One of the things I had heard was that a lot of Cuba's architecture and goods are stuck in the 1950s, because since the revolution, any importation of new products has been strictly limited.  The most obvious sign of this is the cars, which are famed for being run down old Cadillacs and the like.

So I was a little disappointed when we arrived at the airport and saw that the taxis were all modern looking cars.  Were we already too late?  Certainly in the time that we have been here we have seen that there is already a lot of new importation going on, but as we drove from the airport into town, I was pleased to see that while there are new cars around, there is no shortage of those old cars either.   We soon started to see them trundling along the roads - or stuck at the side after breaking down!

Because we were staying in the Verdado area, close to the bus station in readiness for our anticipated early start the next day, we decided to leave going into old Havana until our return.  One of our tasks for the day was to find the bus station and buy our outward tickets, so we set off for a slow amble, checking out the lovely but crumbling old houses and the wheezing cars along the way.

When we got to the bus station, we were told that the early bus was full, so we would have to take the one at around 11am instead.  Whilst it meant we wouldn't get to our destination until the late afternoon, I can't say I was devastated at missing the early start.  So we put our names down on the list with the lady at the first desk, then were sent to the counter to buy our tickets, which we then had to take back to the first desk so that they could put the ticket reference on the list.  Our first taste of the rather odd processes at Cuba bus stations.

With little else to do that day, we had a leisurely lunch at one of the government run restaurants, tried out the local Buccanero beer, which isn't bad, and then tried out our first proper Cuban Cuba Libres.