After a short night in Mexico City we hopped on a Cubana Airlines flight to Havana. We had been told that Cuba wouldn’t stamp our passports since we were American, which turned out to be true but the process what still quite strange. We had to go up to a window one person at a time where we were not spoken to but motioned to stand in front of a camera without smiling to have our picture taken. After some intense stamping of various other documents we were buzzed through a mysterious door to the darkness beyond…hoping the rest of the family would follow. Eventually, everyone did.
We spent the next three days exploring Havana, wandering, eating drinking, listening to music, talking to people, and of course, taking pictures.
We were staying right on the Malecon, which is an 8 mile seawall that runs along the Havana waterfront. It’s a popular hangout place for the locals, especially at night. The second morning we were there Matt went out for a run and discovered that he wasn’t the only one: there was an actual race going on with hundreds of Cubans running past him the other direction and wondering why the crazy foreigner was going the wrong way.
We wandered down the prada, a large street with a park down the middle of it and had an excellent lunch at a small restaurant right along the side. We walked miles and miles over three days and saw many things. I’ll just follow with pictures and some captions.
Capitol building
Cuban rum. So good.
La Floridita, one of Hemingsways favorite spots
Almost everything in Cuba is owned by the state. The hotels, the restaurants, the stores, the taxis, everything. Two of the only ways to have private enterprise were through having a casa particular or a paladar. A casa particular is a house where someone rents out 1-2 rooms to tourists. It’s usually about $25/night and they are allowed to rent out no more than two rooms, which they pay high taxes on. A paladar is a restaurant in someones home, where they are allowed to have no more than 12 tables. The small scale of these businesses means that almost everything the tourist sees is state owned, but we were able to hunt down a number of very good paladars throughout the trip.
The fam, in front of Che
As a result of the illegality of private enterprise and the fact that very few Cubans have much discretionary income, there were very few cafes, minimarts, grocery stores, or sidewalk stands. Throughout our walks when we found ourselves hungry or thirsty it was often a challenge to find a place to satisfy these needs. I don’t think we actually saw a grocery store the entire trip. Not to mention the lack of American products or advertising. Fascinating.
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