From Baracoa to the Capital

From Baracoa, to make my way back up to the capital, I decide to pass through Moa and Guardalavaca instead of returning to Santiago. It was a wrong choice, because Moa is horrible (there's a huge factory built by Che and a stench and pollution like the Ruhr), while Guardalavaca is touristy, with big 4/5-star hotels with pools, but above all to get there I had to spend a lot of money using collective and private taxis that took me only for a steep price (they risk losing their licence and heavy fines if they take tourists). Moreover Guardalavaca, though it has a lovely beach, has only big hotels costing at least 50 dollars a day for the overnight stay alone. After a long and exhausting search I nevertheless managed to secure a room in a private house in the nearby fishing village on the coast. Illegal and at their risk, but I paid little (10 dollars) and ate fish for 5 dollars a meal.

I spent a few days relaxing, going to the tourist beach and getting to know a few tourists and a few Cubans who had managed to slip through the net of the tourist police. Cubans don't have access to the resort as they do on the various tourist islands, which is why for me these resorts aren't interesting. Holguin, the big nearby city, is a garden city, wealthy but not very interesting, so I continued to Santa Clara, where I wanted to visit Che's mausoleum, but a Cuban tells me it's closed for works, so I go on to Santi Espiritu and find, to my surprise, a beautiful, not very touristy and colonial city, being launched as it is under restoration. It resembles the nearby Trinidad a little, though less beautiful and larger.

Trinidad is in fact my next stop and here a great love is born for this city, for its people, for its beaches (Ancon above all), for the natural beauties around it (the valle de Los Ingenios with a vintage train that crosses it and lets you see the sugar-cane plantations that made the city rich, the Iznaga tower that served the watchmen as a lookout to control the slaves in the fields), as well as Pico de Collantes, a very cool mountain spot with waterfalls and a lake where you can go trekking and swimming. There are also other parks, rivers and hills that are very pleasant.

Trinidad, the colonial city par excellence, is a jewel, with its cobbled streets and its beautiful, cool pastel-coloured colonial houses, with their inner gardens and high ceilings, the iron grilles on the large windows facing the street, from which you can admire the fine period furniture and the surviving furnishings that recall the city's happy era. In the evening life is lively in the various venues where they play salsa or put on Afro-Cuban dance shows. There's a lot of movement, plenty of rum, music and beautiful, sexy Cuban women on the hunt for tourists, but kept under watch by the local police, who try to control and prevent contact (with little success). The return to the capital is sad, because the big city is stressful, chaotic, polluted, though very interesting, above all for its fine historic centre and the famous seafront (the Malecon). Until next time!