Category: Sancti Spíritus

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TRINIDAD – Sancti Spiritus, CUB

With today being a free day, most of the group were off either hiking to a nearby waterfall, cruising around on a local catamaran or on a scheduled local tour. Myself and Sarah, a rock licker (Geologist) from Perth, Western Australia decided to meander around town on our own.

We visited the local crafts markets, joined a free city walking tour for a bit, before breaking away for an awesome lunch at the Cubita Santander. A couple of Cristals and a chinwag at the Casa De La Cerveza (House of Beer) and we were back on the streets exploring Trinidad.

We happened upon a couple of galleries which had some stunning artwork on display. I don’t do the whole ‘trinket & t-shirt’ souvenir bullshit thing, but I will purchase artwork, which was the case at Galeria R-Evolucion which features the work of the owner Rafael Alvarez Alonso.

After a second visit to Casa De La Cerveza, Sarah and I returned to the Main Casa to meet up with the rest of the group for our included Salsa dance class. As there were ½ a dozen of us who were not interested in the Salsa lesson, I arranged for Ronaldo to come back instruct us on the art of making a Mojito, a Daiquiri and a Canchánchara as we obviously failed yesterday’s class.

Dinner was held just a little out of town at a place called Restaurante La Marinera whose specialty is seafood and while most of the group decided to continue on at a local nightclub – Discoteca Ayala (The Cave), that is situated in a huge subterranean cave, I on the other hand decided it was best to check my eyelids for holes.

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TRINIDAD – Santci Spiritus, CUB

All of us were up and out of the Hotel Colon before 9AM as we had scheduled a bicycle taxi tour of old town Camagüey.

I have to say outside of staying in The Underground Hotel in Coober Pedy, this is the first hotel I’ve stayed slept in that’s had no windows at all – kind a weird ….. or did they re-purpose a broom closet, because the room sure felt that way.

In just on a hour, we got to see a few of the city’s historical sites like Plaza de los Trabajadores, Teatro Principal de Camagüey and the gallery and street sculptures of renowned local artist Martha Jiminez.

It was then a 3 hour bus ride into Sancti Spiritus where lunch was meant to be a Serrano Ham sandwich at the Taberna Yayabo, which turned into a 2 hour ordeal in which you got two one inch thick slices of dried bread with bacon like pork meat and sweaty cheese for $8 USD that could be best described as a shit sandwich without the bread.

The rest of the afternoon was filled with the 1½ hour drive into Cuba’s third oldest city – Trinidad.

After freshening up, we all met back at the main casa – Casa Anay y Jesus for Ronaldo to both instruct and allow us hands-on tutoring in the making of a Mojito, a Daiquiri and a Canchánchara, which I might add, was a hell of a lot of fun.

Dinner was a group affair at the main casa before quite a few of us headed out to a local square which was pumping with locals bands at Casa de la Música.

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SANCTI SPÍRITUS – Sancti Spíritus, CUB

Today was a 7-hour bus trip to the regional town of Sancti Spiritus located 380 kilometres ((240 miles) from Havana. Thankfully it was on one of the air-conditioned Transtur tourist coaches and not the local service, busted arse Toyota coaster or mini-van.

The trip was broken up with regular breaks along the way including lunch at Pia Cua where they are apparently known for their Cubano sandwiches. For $5 USD you got two pieces of grilled bread, a piece of dry cold roast pork, a slice of lettuce, tomato and cheese with a choice of ketchup, mustard, HP or Worcestershire sauces. The sandwich was nothing like the Cubano sandwiches I came to love and enjoy in Little Havana in Miami.

From there it was about an hour’s drive to the mausoleum of Ernesto “Che” Guevara, just outside the town of Villa Clara. Che was the Argentine born doctor who became one of the heroes of the Cuban revolution and right hand man to Fidel Castro. Of interest was how passionate our guide was in telling the story of Che, in which he was literally brought to tears.

We managed to walk the oldest bridge in Cuba, that crosses the Rio Yayabo and continued on foot to our stop for the night – Sancti Spriritus.

We had an unscheduled last minute change in hotels, due to the original not having any water. This saw us freshen up at our new digs at the Hotel Plaza before heading for a meal at Meson de la Plaza. A little further research in my Best Cuban Mojito endeavours back at the hotel rounded off a great day. Whilst there, I noticed the bar doing a roaring trade in selling Havana Club rum by the litre bottle for $3 USD to passing traffic. The doorman was even in on the action as he was ferrying rum to cars or motorbike parked at the footpath.