Trinidad

We went to Trinidad a week and a half ago. Originally, we were supposed to go Santiago de Cuba and Baracoa as part of our spring break trip; however, because of recurring earthquakes in the area, the University decided that it was best not to risk a trip to the western part of the island. Instead, we were allowed to organize our own trip to Trinidad, located in the center of the island on the southern coast, about an hour away from Cienfuegos.

Because there were nine of us, we got a large van to take us on the five hour ride. The town of Trinidad is Cuba’s best historically preserved city. It was built in the late 18th and early 19th centuries by sugar barons who had come from Haiti (which had just undergone the bloody Haitian Revolution) to establish Cuba as the largest sugar exporter in the world. The area was devastated by Cuba’s first attempt at revolution and the sugar plantations of the area never recovered. The result was that the city was neglected for more than a hundred years – allowing the beautiful buildings that still make up the historical city center to remain – before UNESCO granted it a World Heritage Site designation and the government began restoring the city.

Jonathan, Maeve and Ani in front of Trinidad's old square

The town is beautiful. Like Cienfuegos, there’s not too much too see, but just walking around on the old cobblestone streets and looking at the French-inspired architecture were inspiring enough. We stayed at two Casas in the historical district of the town; after some negotiating we managed to get them to let us stay three people in one room so that Zack wouldn’t have to pay an extra.

Cocounts outside our Casa

Our first afternoon we walked around the historical area of the town. I bought a guayabera, a traditional shirt worn by Cubans which has four pockets and largely ornamental creases and buttons all over it. After eating dinner at a great paladar, we went to a club which was literally located inside a cave. The club entrance at the surface revealed a long stairway down reminiscent of the cave from Aladdin. Once we got to the bottom we went through a narrow passageway and came out into a large cavern. It was amazing – the cave roof must have been about 40 feet above us, but we could still see the different limestone formations like stalactites and stalagmites. The cavern had three different levels for dancing and two bars – it was huge. Other than the fact that it was in a cave, it was just like every other club that we have been to in Cuba.

On our second day in Trinidad we hired a taxi to take us to the Escambray Mountains located a short distance away. After a 45 minute drive up a windy road we arrived at one of Cuba’s national parks. We got out and hiked for another 45 minutes and arrived at a large waterfall that had a nice swimming hole. We swam around for an hour and jumped off one of the rocks into the swimming hole before hiking back.

The swimming hole and the girls being silly

That night we each ate at our own Casas – ours served a delicious dish of curry shrimp, beans, rice, salad and fried viands (we’re still not sure what makes up a viand). After dinner, Jonathan, Ani, Maeve, Zack and I (who were all staying at one Casa) met up with the other group (Emily, Rachael, Gina and Katie) at their house and had a delicious canchanchara – a drink made of rum, water, honey and lime juice. A few of us then went to talk at the park and listen to some of the music at the Casa de la Musica. We even danced a little bit even though a shockingly good German dancer made me feel really self-conscious about my own dance skills.

View of Trinidad and the Escambray Mountains

A car on one of Trinidad's streets

The next day we rented bikes and biked to the beach. Unfortunately, we missed the road to the beach and ended up biking 22 kilometers, 15 more than we were supposed to. Along the way, Zack’s tire blew out, Gina’s chain broke and the whole group split up. It was a total disaster. Fortunately, some nice garbage men picked Gina, Zack and Katie up, put their bikes in the back and drove them the remaining 10 km to the beach. The rest of us straggled to beach eventually. The beach itself, called Playa Ancon, was beautiful. We ate a decent lunch on the beach itself and swam around for a bit before getting two taxis to drive us back with our bikes.

Rachael on the first leg of our 22 km bike ride

After getting into a heated argument with the guy who rented us the bikes, we went back to our Casas to pick up our stuff before we got on the taxi. On the way back, we stopped by Cienfuegos to introduce Jonathan to Casa del Sandwich, making it the fifth time I’d been to that restaurant.

Cienfuegos

I need to apologize to all of you who read this – I’ve fallen behind. I’ll do my best to catch you up.

Three weeks ago we went to Cienfuegos. Cienfuegos is a medium-sized city mid-way across the island on the southern coast. The city is known for its nightlife and music as well as for being the most-architecturally uniform city on the island – a distinction that made it a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Thanks to revenue from that organization and from tourism, the city has been able to restore and maintain a large part of the buildings that make up the city core.

My usual travelling partners of Katie, Maeve and Ani arrived at Cienfuegos on Saturday morning. We checked into our subpar casa particular (the host was a sleazy man of about 50 who dressed 30 years too young and the rooms were dark and lifeless) and quickly left to walk around. There wasn’t too much to actually see in the city itself – the city does have nice late 19^th century neoclassical architecture, but there weren’t many buildings that really stood out to us. One that did was the beautiful home of a Spanish merchant on the far end of the Cienfuegos peninsula which was built in a striking Moorish-Arabic design with some neoclassical elements thrown in.

After walking around for a bit and finding out that the ferry to the famous castle on the other side of the Cienfuegos bay was broken we got lunch at the Casa de Sandwich. It was love at first site. I started talking to a big guy who let people in and out of the restaurant named Darien and he recommended the Cuban sandwich (ironically, the first one we had seen in Cuba) which had three different types of pork and cheese on it. It was absolutely delicious and well worth the 1.5 hour wait. We also made friends with Darien, who gave me his email and phone number. Little did we know that our lunch at the Casa de Sandwich was the first of many forays into that little restaurant.

After lunch we walked around some more and went into a little amusement park to goof off on the go-karts and bumper cars. We then ran into the other part of our group who had come in from Santa Clara that morning – Emily, Rachael, Lily and Zack. We got dinner together at the Casa de Sandwich (2^nd time – Darien was happy to see us) and then went to hang out at one of the docks and the malecon. There was a huge open-air party that we went to briefly before heading back to our respective casas.

One of the more decrepit houses in Cienfuegos

View from the Casa de Cultura of the main square

The next day we woke up and had lunch at – surprise – Casa de Sandwich. After lunch we caught a bus to Rancho Luna, the beach closest to Cienfuegos. The beach was gorgeous. I also got to play around with my camera and took a multiple exposure shot of Ani jumping around the beach.

We had a tough time getting back to Havana – the cab driver that we had arranged to pick us up did not come at 8 like he said he would; he showed up at 8:30 saying his car was broken and that we would have to wait until 4 am to leave. Naturally we were angry about this and went about trying to figure another way back to Havana. After trying for four hours (including two hours at the Casa de Sandwich where Darien tried his best to get us a ride from some of his friends) we finally gave in and arranged to sleep at our Casa till 4. We got up and ready to go, but the taxi never came. After waiting for an hour and walking to the bus station, we gave up and went back to sleep. We got up again at 7 and ran into the taxi driver from night before and I yelled at him for a few minutes before he scampered off and got us a driver who finally drove us back. It was a bad end to an otherwise enjoyable weekend.