Cuba

We landed in Cuba to a wall of heat! We were spending the first four nights in a casa particular, this is basically when you stay in someone's house and is a great way to get to know the culture and people of Cuba. The taxi dropped at Casa Tamara where we were met by Tamara herself and shown to our room.

We were keen to get out and about straight away so hit the streets to explore Havana's central streets. Havana is an amazing city and so different to all the cities we'd been so far, the architecture is beautiful and the streets are filled with vintage cars. It wasn't until we'd walked for about half an hour that we realised we were yet to pass any shops, there were a few restaurants on the streets, ice cream parlours and a cinema but hardly any stores.

We ended up walking down to the ocean front and so stopped in at the Hotel Nacional de Cuba for a drink. The hotel, now govenment owned, used to be a hangout for the film stars and mobsters in the 1930s. We had a daiquiri in the terrace bar, enjoying view of the beautiful gardens and buildings.

That evening we hit the town (!), we had some pretty basic food in a cafe with some live music, then we visited Ernest Hemingway's favourite bar for another daquiri before jumping in a lada to deliver us back to Tamara's!

The next day (another boiling day of uninterrupted sun!) we opted to take the bus tour to see the most favourite sites of Havana. This was a fantastic way to explore the city, see the main sites and gain a true understanding of the place. We jumped off the bus at several stops, including the Plaza de la Revolucion where we saw the Jose Marti Memorial and the famous Che Guevara image with the slogan 'Hasta la Victoria Siempre' (Forever Onwards Towards Victory) on the the wall of the Ministry of the Interior building. The square is most notable as being where many political rallies take place and Fidel Castro and other political figures address the nation.

Later that evening we went out for pizza with some of the other guests in the hostel, it was a bit of a different dining experience for us, as we vivited a local restaurant where they use the local currency, therefore it was extremely cheap for us - about 10p for a pizza! As we discovered though, if you want to use local money you must eat as a local, therefore the choices are limited and menus are redundant, you should simply ask them what they have and that's what you'll be eating! After dinner we headed for ice cream then a beer as we strolled along the Malecon, before jumping in a Lada taxi back to the Casa.

The next morning we visited the Partagas Cigar Factory, we really enjoyed the tour round the factory, especially watching the cigars being hand rolled by workers. The wages here are 30 CUC a week, a good wage in Cuban term, and jobs are much sought after by Cubans thus they are prepared to train for 9 months. They most interesting bit to me was to see and hear the reader relaying novels to the workers, in fact Romeo y Julieta cigars got their name because the workers were so fond of Shakespeares being read to them.

In the afternoon we went down to check out the Old Town, this is a beautiful area of Havana and we loved it (so much that we went back the next day!) and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. We had a lovely lunch in a German bar located in a large square suurounded by recently refurbished baroque and neo classical buildings. After chilling out with a cold drink we meandered around the cobbled streets, taking shelter from the heat in some of the cool courtyards and pretty gardens and nosied around the book market for a couple of books for us to read by the pool. On the way back to Tamara's we stopped off at the Hotel Inglaterra for a drink and to shelter for the early evening downpour!

Later that evening we visited another local restaurant for some cheap food, saving our pennies to go out for an evening in the old town. The rain was still pouring down so we shared a cab with some local people to get to Habana Vieja, it was an old station wagon that had been converted into a mini bus with benches in the back - it was a bit of a squeeze but good fun. We had identified a small street earlier in the day with some lively bars on it, so we popped into a couple of them to enjot some local cocktails and live music! Our taxi journey home was fairly eventful, we found a lovely guy who was willing to take us back for a reasonable price, the only issue was that he had no idea where we were going! We had a great tour of the backstreets of Havana for about half an hour before we finally located our Casa!

The final day in Havana was once again spent wandering around Havana Vieja, purchasing some cigars and generally enjoying the ambience. We finished the day off with a truly awful meal, using up the last of our local currency! We were definitely ready for some better food at the all inclusive which we were off to next!

Our taxi transfer to Jibacoa was around an hour and we really loved the journey through the Cuban countryside, our taxi driver seemed to enjoy it too as he managed a visit to his favourite food stall for a barbecued pork sandwich.

As we opened the door to our hotel there were some pretty excited shouts from Lynne as she spotted the bath!! It was a lovely room with a huge bed, cable tv, minibar and large french windows looking out onto the ocean! After 9 months of backpacking, we were in heaven! The next few days were a blur of swimming in the pool, sunbathing at the beach, playing tennis, experimenting at the cocktail bar and generally indulging ourselves!

So after 9 months of travelling, we woke up to our last morning of our honeymoon! It seemed surreal to imagine that in just 24 hours we would be landing at London Gatwick! We were so excited to see all our friends and family but we would miss the excitement of travelling - the anticipation of arriving at a new place, the fun of making friends and trying new experiences. We lounged by the pool until our transfer arrived and then for the last time loaded our back packs onto the bus...homeward bound!!