Today is our moving day so time to say our au revoir to Amed and Ines and pay our bill, which, it turns out, was amazingly low! Our host, Amed, was kind enough to walk us to our new place on the Prado.
Casa 1935 - Fabio y Guilda is spacious (in some places the ceilings go up forever!), very clean and our hosts seem welcoming and friendly. Who is that guy in our doorway?We have an ample bedroom, a kind of sitting room and a patio just outside our room and we have already been promised soup and fresh fish for dinner so we are well situated.
And, while on the subject of things like electrical wires - can I add plumbing? Except for the hotel, there is a conspicuous absence of sink and shower hot water taps in bathrooms here, including both the casas in which we have lived. There is hot water in the showers provided by a rather large shower head device which is also a hot water heater - a mechanism for heating the water on demand, which, in principle, is a very good idea. What is a bit unsettling, however, is the visible electrical wiring at the top of this unit which, along with one's imagining of the potential consequences if water and electrical current came in contact with each other while one is showering, gives one pause. This arrangement provides a reasonable shower albeit with somewhat unpredictable temperature and pressure (the pressure is only as great as the height of the building can provide since, as I mentioned in an earlier post, it appears that water has to be pumped up to a tank on the roof to provide the pressure) and a slight concern about the potential for an electricity-water mixture.
To give a bit more info about our new place, this is the "patio" area just outside our room which is through the closest set of louvered doors to the right along the walkway. As you can see, it is roofless (well not totally) and at the far end above is a spiral staircase to where? We have no idea what is up on the second floor or the floor - if there is one - to which the spiral staircase leads. The kitchen and dining area are through the far doorway and there is more to this dwelling that we never did see.
After resting (even napping) we decided to go out for some lunch and to check out the bank location and to find the bus station.
We found the bank (closed because it is Sunday) that the Lonely Planet book says provides the best exchange value and duly noted its location.
A check on the internet locations but they have no cards (for User ID and password) so we are out of luck - a problem we have encountered before. So, we went to the restaurant in the hotel for some lunch.
After lunch we went to check out the bus station from which we will leave for Varadero on the 21st to catch our flight to Toronto on the 22nd. We found the bus station about 6 or 7 blocks from the plaza and, I confess that I was more distressed at the conditions than I was expecting. It is rather run down, darkish and quite unkempt and the bus schedule, a chalk board in the basement departure area, gave extremely little information and none at all about buses to Varadero. Quite depressing. So, tomorrow we will have to go back to the tourist information kiosk to try to get some clarification about the bus. It's Cuba - nothing seems to be completely straight forward, at least by our standards.
Back at our new home we sat in the patio area for a very pleasant, getting to know you kind of visit, with our hosts, Aglaes, who speaks English quite well, and her husband, Fabio whose English is like my Spanish - close to zero. Fabio's father, Fabio senior, shares the place with them. They also have a delightfully engaging nearly 4 year old daughter, Fabiaglaes (I think - a combination of their names). She quickly became very friendly, especially with Bob, regaling us with conversation - in Spanish, of course, and though we didn't understand the words it didn't really seem to matter to her. In time, Bob began to understand bits and these moments gave the appearance, at least, of two way conversations.
Fabio, we were told, is a chef so the meals, once again, promise to be very good and, generally, they were, though much more food than I was able to eat - yet. And all meals were accompanied by music and served proudly with a smile and, a bit later, the question - "Good?". Fabio diligently started the CD player at the beginning of each dinner providing a range of music, no doubt carefully selected. It was a very friendly family ambience made more so by Fabiaglase frequently passing through the dining room and pausing to share her stream of thoughts with us until Fabio noticed her and encouraged her to leave us.
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