Captivating Cuba - CKU2504
After picking up our bikes at our garage in the outskirts of Havana we took of south west towards the Sierra del Rosario. Beautiful nature awaits us, nice vistas and Dorothy and Shane swim in the San Juan river. Now the road is more curvy and the vegetation grows in from both sides but also potholes getting more and more. But no traffic at all, so we can cruise around them. The landscape changes again, higher and higher limestone cliffs around us and especially the last 35 km we ride through an epic scenery, traditional farms in the subtropical surrounding. And then we reach our beautiful hotel on top of a hill overlooking the "land of Mogotes ", the Valle de Vinales. What a beautiful day! A couple of times the power is off, making taking a shower an adventure and dinner interesting as well:-) Welcome to Cuba!
A relaxed morning ride through the epic landscape brings us to an Artist's 120m wide painting on a rock face, displaying the theory of evolution...one doesn't have to like it but unique it is anyway. We make our way to Pinar del Rio which is claimed to be the best tobacco growing area on this earth. The visit at an authentic tobacco farm is super informative and interesting, definitely a highlight today! After a lunch with lobster! we move on through rural area - and a stretch on the Autopista - to Soroa back in the Sierra del Rosario. Our hotel for tonight sits just on top of a mountain, what a beautiful and peaceful place! Shane just returns from the pool and says, one just hear birds...another day in paradise. In the evening - guess what - the power is off again :-))
The name of our Castillo de Las Nubes is correct, we are in the clouds this morning. We got early up and discovered that we are on Cuba (again:-)...the breakfast is a bit delayed. We start 20 minutes behind schedule but all good, the winding road through this tropical nature with 0 traffic is magical. After a couple of km on the highway we take off into the rural area south of Havana...farms, stretches of forests, villages, ox carts, dogs, horses and people greeting friendly. The ride through the backcountry is just beautiful. Then a longer ride on the Autopista before we meet the Caribbean Sea at Playa Larga. A swim at Las cuevas de los Pesces, later learning about the revolution and the Bay of Pigs invasion...a 100km more and we reach Cienfuegos, La perla del Sur just before the rain starts. A long but beautiful day!
A super day today! A short city walk in the morning, then a super beautiful ride on small twisty and bumpy roads to the El Nicho waterfalls at the foothills of the Sierra del Escambray. Later on a small mountain road to the national parc Topes de Collantes. Another curvy road brings us down to Trinidad. What a ride today!!!
In the morning we had a city walk in Trinidad, Unesco world heritage since 1988. Beautiful and nice to see how lively everything is and despite frequent power shortages you hear music everywhere...la pura vida! In the afternoon relaxing, fueling up the bikes (whenever we have the chance). Now the sun sets soon and we will have our dinner in relaxed Trinidad.
A relaxed morning start and now we ride to the Valle del Ingenios, the sugar mill valley...in the 18th and 19th century more than 30.000 slaves working here for the sugar barons. After climbing the former observation tower we are back on backcountry roads towards Santa Clara, the place of the last battle of the revolutionists against the Batista regime, led by Che Guevarra. We visit the Mausoleum which contains a museum as well. After lunch we visit a cigar factory on our way to Remedios. And not enough we visit as well the the museo Agroindustria de Azucarera...Another amazing day!!
Around 240 clicks to Varadero, okay let's go and in the early afternoon we arrive in our beach resort. Now the holiday starts :-))
Swimming in the ocean in the morning, breakfast, relaxing in our resort, what a start into our last riding day to La Habana. The sun is high up but the speed cools and we have a couple of stops, Bacunayagua bridge, Jiacoba beach for a foto, fuel (! better outside of Havana, inside one might wait for a very long time), Ernest Hemingway memorial, Fortessa de los Tres Reyes del Morro...then we ride around the harbor, more busy roads now making our way thru La Habana towards our Garage. This was like an exclusive tour for us. Beautiful Cuba you stay in our hearts and we cross our fingers that economy will hopefully get better in future and will feed you better with everything! Thank you very much to our clients on this tour and safe travels home! Yours Holger and Anivar