El Corazón Cubano
We arrived in Varadero in early afternoon, greeted at a large concrete customs dock by our agent, health inspectors and immigration agents. They checked our COVID vaccines, the first since moving onto the boat, and took our temperatures. Two women toured the boat looking for…people? food? animals? and eventually decided we needed to hardboil our eggs or throw them out. The agents put tamper tape on the drone so that we wouldn’t use it while there. Overall, they were very pleasant.
At the dock we met an American who regularly brings…tourists? drugs? smuggled items? from south Florida to Cuba via the Bahamas. He was chatty, maybe a bit odd, but then we realized we needed his help. We had very few US dollars with us and we knew our credit cards wouldn’t work, so we asked him if he would give us cash in exchange for venmo. Thank goodness he had $2000 in crisp bills at the ready. No judgment here.
The marina at Varadero is a bad Disney-land of ill-formed government aspirations. As a fairly new (2018-ish) government marina it holds nearly 1000 boats and is surrounded by condos, hotels, restaurants and boardwalks. And nearly all of it is empty. We were one of about 6 tourist boats and perhaps 5 local day trip catamarans. The buildings have furniture but no people. The government minimarket sold a useless mix of ketchup, powdered orange coloring and shredded mozzarella cheese but they wouldn’t take my US credit card and they wouldn’t take Cuban pesos, so I bought none of the above.
Luckily we had intel and a connection from a fellow cruiser in the Bahamas. Jose, the marina manager, was the guy to know. I tried to exchange USD at the government exchange and got CUP 110 to USD $1. Jose took our cash and came back with a black market exchange rate of CUP 352 to $1. Keep in mind, I still can’t use this cash at any government business because they don’t take pesos…. Luckily, Cuba is filled with markets and independent businesses that do take pesos.
To thank Jose for his help, we took him, Gus’ sister Eliza who had just arrived from England, and the whole crew to get lobsters from a local spot. For 6 lobsters, 8 beers, 4 sodas, chicken and sausage appetizers, our total was CUP 12,000 or $35 USD. If you know where to go, Cuba is an incredible value and we were full of love and lobster.
We spent another three days in Varadero and took a taxi into Santa Marta to the local market where we found a whole array of food including chicken, eggs, watermelon, sweet potatoes, avocadoes, pineapple and much more. We had espressos at a cafe, tacos for lunch and ice cream for dessert. This is not the Cuba Russ remembers from the early 2000s where it was rice and beans 24/7.
Another day we took the double decker tourist bus to the Santa Marta beach and had another lobster lunch and enjoyed mojitos on the most beautiful, nearly empty white sand beach before driving home in an amazing Barbie convertible (yes, he played “Barbie Girl” the whole way). The area from Varadero into Santa Marta is a long strip of high rise mega-resorts. Some certainly had guests but it was clear that the whole area was maybe at 10% capacity and 100% of the 10% were Canadian and Russian.
****Side Cruiser Note****
At the Varadero marina we met a German solo-sailor named Kai, who is also a super kind and cool professional guitarist. He had sailed - alone - from Germany to visit his daughter who is studying in Havana. Well, Russ grew up and went to high school in New York. Kai spent a year of high school in New York. As it turns out, they were at Mamaroneck high school at the same time, only one year apart! While they didn’t know each other then, here we were almost 40 years later, in Cuba. We enjoyed music and meals with Kai before parting ways. His wife at home even found the yearbook and sent the photos!
****Havana****
We set sail around 5:15pm for Havana, planning to do the 80 miles overnight to arrive with minimal wind through the narrow reef that is the only entry to Havana. Again, we were greeted warmly and they checked the boat thoroughly, though our customs officer balked at the measly $20 tip we gave him when he held out his hand.
Just minutes from the marina on the main road into town we stopped in front of the Swiss Embassy. This beautiful yellow mansion that used to belong to my best friend Gina’s family. Her grandmother was born there, and they emigrated to Miami when her mother was young. It was surreal to stand there, thinking of what life must have been like before, and all the things that happened since, for Gina and I to meet in 1994 at Chattahoochee HS. And here I was standing in front of her family home, which they haven’t seen in over 60 years.
The rest of Havana unfolded as a series of beautiful surprises. Over the course of a week, we walked miles from Vedado to El Centro to Old Havana to the Plaza Vieja. The buildings are as beautiful as those in Paris. From a rooftop cafe we could be in Washington, DC. The cafes serve coffee that put others to shame, and the English/Spanish bookstore buzzed with conversation. The people are kind, the streets are filled with art and music. We ate delicious, inventive food and bought clothes from some of the first private enterprises in the country. I ignorantly expected a gray dystopia of concrete and warships (no doubt a combination of US propaganda and lack of knowledge) and found Cuba to be incredibly vibrant, colorful and unapologetically handsome (with the notable exception of the very concrete and windowless Russian embassy). Even our taxi rides were filled with commentary from our kind and protective driver who animatedly whispered to Russ about how “thees government is sheet.”
Hannah and I went to the cabaret at the Tropicana, a joyful mix of song and dance that would only be better if we spoke Spanish (a common sentiment for me during our travels). We walked and kids rollerbladed to Fusterlandia, a shiny example of how one artist, Jose Fuster, decorated his neighborhood in mosaics, eventually creating an artist’s paradise and transforming a once-poor neighborhood into a tourist destination. And he happened to be there, so we got a photo with Señor Fuster!
Having resigned our Annapolis Yacht Club membership during the Black Lives Matter movement several years ago, we decided to maintain a connection to Cuba by joining the privately owned Hemingway Yacht Club. We took photos with the Commodore and shared a pizza dinner there with new French friends on SV Aurijin. The next morning we left Cuba for Mexico with two hitchhikers on board(more on that in the next post).
****Valle de Viñales****
A day trip in an antique car took us 2 hours outside of Havana to the center of the Cuban cigar economy. The fields are perfect for tobacco farming, the fincas still family-run. We traded the antique car for horse and carriage because while cool to look at, they aren’t comfortable to ride in, and our guide unexpectedly didn’t speak English. A quick Whatsapp to another cruiser put me in touch with an English-speaking guide who met us in Viñales with a cigar in his mouth and a horse and carriage on call. And that is how the day went from bad to incredible within minutes. Jose Carlos was the quintessential Cuban cowboy, never seen without a lit cigar in hand and hat on his head. Through the hills we ended up at Finca Esmeralda, where we soaked up the country sun, learned that 90% of the tobacco grown is obligated to be given to the government, and that the only quality Cuban cigars are hand-rolled from full leaves on small farms (the government mixes its leaf pieces with chemicals and sells them for 2x the price). Is it touristy? Sure. Did I fall in love anyway? Absolutely.
Our tour included caves on the property, a lesson on Cuban coffee and rum, and a delicious lunch with two different meats, beans, rice, vegetables and a canchanchara - the most delicious rum drink that predates the mojito. At the end of the day, before swapping the horse and carriage for a modern taxi back to Havana, we stood at the overlook taking in the green valley. It was a whole world of blue and green.
****Reflections on Cuba****
As I write this months after visiting, and after Cuba has suffered from hurricanes, earthquakes and power outages, my heart breaks for the determined and cheerful people living there. No doubt their life experience is the opposite of our time in their country. Every day for them is a struggle. Parents are pleased when their children get work in the US, even if it means they may never see them again. The government pays its citizens on a debit card, but there is no cash in the machines. Every Cuban lives two separate lives: one for the government and a second on the black market, where it is possible to earn money and obtain most things — for a price.
Cuba is one of the most diverse and beautiful countries we’ve visited. It has a cosmopolitan city, charming towns, lush countryside, endless white sand beaches and a multitude of artists and entrepreneurs. To talk only about the crumbling buildings and antique cars is to miss what’s happened there all along, in spite of. And one can only imagine the modern, developed mess of roads and ticky-tacky houses Cuba would be were it not isolated for 60 years. It seems that pure Communism and pure Capitalism are two sides of the same coin, each forcing a different type of poverty - of stomachs or of souls. Cuba may physically be stuck in time, but behind the facade, life is lived—vivid, fascinating and boundless—in the Cuban Heart.
