Richard Pickering's Blog: Cuba - Day 19, January 21st

Today is travel day - from Cienfuegos to Varadero - to catch the Westjet flight home tomorrow afternoon.

Breakfast at 8 then some final packing before our taxi - Fabio kindly arranged for one of his taxi driving friends to pick us up at 9:45 to take us to the bus station. At around 9 or so we were very pleasantly surprised by a visit from our first Casa host, Amed - we were hoping to see him before leaving but as time was getting short it seemed increasingly unlikely. He arrived with a couple small gifts - a copy of his book for Bob and a Cuban straw hat for me.- perfect! as I had mentioned to him that I was considering getting one.

Minutes after Amed left the taxi arrived and, with mucho gracias's etc., we were hustled into the taxi - another of Fabio's friends' classic Cuban taxis! And, it turns out that, by chance, I had taken a photo of this vehicle (remember this car?) days earlier, unaware that it was a taxi - so here is a photo of the outside. The inside is definitely something else! Like some of the other taxis, the seats were very soft and have clearly experienced repeated repair, there was no covering over the inside of doors, and when Bob tried to close the partially open front door the driver said not to bother- it would be fine.

To start the car he reached under the dash, pulled out several wires, put them together and, presto, the engine sprang to life! though hesitantly. But, we were off, at least for a few moments, when he suddenly stopped the car and without any explanation, got out and left us. We had no idea what was going on but it seems the police had stopped him for we know not what. After a few anxious moments, at least on my part, he returned with a big grin, started the car with his wire trick, and we were once again on route to the estacion de l'autobus.

We had already bought our tickets but were still a bit uncertain how to negotiate things at the bus station. Fortunately, Amed had given us some advice so we were at least partially prepared and managed to get to the correct location in the station (there are no signs so if we hadn't had the advice of Amed, we would have almost certainly been confused about where to go and how to get there). And checking our bags turned out to be easy after parting with a CUC peso or two. So we were happy to be there at the requisite 30 minutes before the scheduled bus departure but also, based on our previous bus trip with Viazul being 1.5 hours late, thinking we may have a long wait. Not so - the bus arrived pretty much on schedule and left only minutes late. The route to Varadero seemed a bit circuitous, but the trip was very enjoyable so didn't seem like 4 hours.

Ah, Varadero - what a difference from Havana and Cienfuegos! We are clearly in tourist land. From what I have seen so far, this seems a reasonable place to come and experience warm to hot weather in January - which is fine - but it is not a place to come to experience Cuba. And, had it not been for travelling with Bob, who has been to Cuba several times and knows some Spanish, I would likely have gone the Varadero route and missed the opportunity to experience Cuba in the way we did. It's true that our time in Cuba was marred by illness but, as inconvenient as that was, I would definitely recommend our experience of Cuba over the ambience of Varadero.

For example, who could forget Habana Vieja, its sounds and smells, its charm and spirit, its opulence "cheek by jowl" with its warts of poverty and decay,