Cuba Free Travel Guide + Things to Note

Cuba is a very mysterious country and one of the few socialist countries in the world. It has a very high reputation. The Cuban Missile Crisis happened here, and the famous Cuba Cigars are famous all over the world. Let me share with you the travel guide for Cuba.

Wandering on the streets of Havana, I suddenly remembered that in a chat last year, I was casually asked if there was a place I particularly wanted to visit next year. I mentioned Mexico and Cuba without hesitation. Speaking of which, I am really a long-term lover when it comes to traveling.

At the beginning of this year, Mexican Airlines had several big promotions. Seeing the air tickets from Shanghai to Havana dropped from 5 to 4 and then to 3, I was angry that I didn’t buy them when they were the cheapest.

After taking the flight, I felt that Air Mexico was surprisingly okay. Just like South Africa at this time last year, this year’s trip to Cuba was also a welcome ceremony of nearly 20 hours in economy class.

Walking alone, taking photos with mobile phone throughout. (I brought a camera but never took it out)

The days without Internet

It is said that Cuba was almost completely isolated from the world a few years ago. Now it is much better, but there are only certain There is internet at those locations. I am used to seeing a row of names on my phone when opening the wifi list elsewhere, but in Cuba this page is often empty.

Some high-end hotels have Internet access, but the front desk arrogantly and coldly stated that Internet access cards are only sold to hotel guests. Most tourists and locals buy Internet cards from telecommunications bureaus or street vendors, and then gather in small parks to surf the Internet. The picture of a bunch of people squatting in a row and playing with their mobile phones is very beautiful.

The Internet card is measured in hours, and the countdown starts the moment you log in. The price is very expensive.

After getting used to the days without the Internet, I realized that I no longer needed the Internet. I don’t know what to do even with the wifi. Thousands of group messages on WeChat popped up little by little, but I didn’t want to click on any of them. In the first two days, I will still need to check some things and add a few words to make my presence felt.

On the third day, I was holding my cell phone at a loss, so I started to search for the names of the stars I saw last night - Orion led two hounds, big and small, chasing Taurus ahead. The three particularly bright ones were " "Winter Triangle", that star glowing with icy blue light is the legendary Sirius, the brightest star in the night sky.

After that, I didn’t even buy an Internet card. It felt good to be isolated from the world. There aren’t that many people looking for you, and there aren’t that many things to deal with. People do not need mobile phones, Internet, memories of the past and expectations for the future.

Havana

Latvia has gorgeous floor carvings, South Africa has colorful streets that are beyond imagination, India has broken-down buildings and villains that can be easily photographed, and Cuba has all three. Yes, there are also classic cars running all over the streets.

There are colorful convertible classic cars for you to choose from in the square in the city center. Each one is more aggressive than the other. Taking a spin is a reserved part of the program. You can see them on the streets from time to time. If you praise them a few times, the driver will let you go up and take pictures. It's very generous.

Painting the streets in Havana is a lot of fun. I listened to the piano and watched mass, leaving aside the traditional tourist area-like square church in the old city. Each alley has patches of colorful dilapidated buildings, winding like a maze.

Rickshaws moved slowly, students after classes were walking through in brown school uniforms and white stockings, and people lined up in front of supply and marketing cooperative-like stores to buy food and daily necessities. The shit on the street doesn't seem so unbearable anymore.

On the last day, I met two compatriots from China. Not long after they arrived, they were exhausted mentally and physically by the hawkers chatting up all over the street. Why am I rarely approached for rent, asked for change, or sold cigars stolen from the factory? Maybe it’s because I have a cold and poor face

Cuban people are very dissolute. Really, there are people sitting in twos and threes at the door, praising you for your beauty (they all praise the beauty of a woman passing by), staring at you and making gestures, and even more profligately, blowing kisses in the street.

But he mostly jokes, there is nothing really aggressive, and he doesn't pester people. After three or four days of free roaming in Havana, I still felt safe.

There are always bands playing in the roadside taverns. Occasionally I walked at night, and there were a few times when I just listened to loud Latin American music more than ten meters away, thinking it was the legendary Cuban nightlife. When I got closer, I saw that there was a stereo set up on the street. It was like a big disco. The picture was so beautiful.

You can see these street performers in almost all Havana travel notes

A Caribbean girl buying papaya

A young man holding a papaya Mouse, another guy picked up a fish

Cubans queuing up to buy newspapers

For some reason, it feels like there are so many barbershops in Cuba

Hemingway In Cuba

Hemingway lived in Cuba for many years. Before buying Fincala Vigia on the outskirts of Havana, he lived in Suite 511 on the top floor of the Mundos Hotel in the old town of Ambos. He wrote "Death in the Afternoon", "Green Mountains of Africa", "Although there is nothing" Three books. The hotel's elegant green lobby is filled with Hemingway's photos, and the room is reserved as a museum. You can buy tickets to visit. Hemingway's room was unexpectedly much simpler than expected. The rooftops and streets of the old city could be seen from the window. The walls were covered with Impressionist paintings such as Manedegaard, and there were various versions of translations and typewriters and windbreakers used by the writer.

Hemingway said: My mojito in Bodeguita. Tavern.

Naturally, it is crowded with tourists inside and outside, and there are often live performances. El

There are dozens of daiquiri on Floridita’s wine list, which makes it difficult to choose. I originally wanted to order a few more glasses to try, but I saw the uncle picking up the rum bottle and stuffing it in. Pour, good guy, after one glass I can’t hold it anymore.

Most people order a glass of the iconic Daiquirí Floridita. My cup is thePapa named after the writer himself

Hemingway, with grapefruit juice and more rum added. After drinking it, I sat in the shade of the Plaza de Armas for more than an hour before I recovered. .

Caribbean Blue

There is sea in Havana, but it is not a seaside, but a bay. Local children were playing skateboards under the huge monument on the seaside, and some were jogging along the seaside road. When the classic car turned a corner, there was a section of sea exposed between two dilapidated buildings. The wind blew against it, which was amazing.

When I was in Trinidad, I went to Playa, recommended by the landlord,

Ancón, a beach more than ten kilometers away from the town. There are only one or two modest hotels dotting the area for several kilometers, while the beach itself is free and open to everyone. The sand is warm and fine, and the layered Caribbean Sea is like jelly.

The deep blue sea connects to the skyline, with a robin-egg cyan blue in the middle. The innermost part is completely clear and transparent, reflecting the white sand, and the water waves ripple beautifully under the scorching Caribbean sun.

Locals soaked in the water with their families and drank rum vigorously from plastic cups. European and American tourists in twos and threes changed into bikinis and swam lightly in the empty sea water.

Trinidad, night and morning

The small town of Trinidad in central Cuba is said to still completely retain its style from the 19th century. It was a sunny day when we arrived, and it looked more like a hot and dry Caribbean town.

The streets are full of colorful low-rise huts and carved gates. The main means of transportation is horse-drawn carriages, and there are narrow gravel roads. It is really like a movie, so beautiful.

Trinidad is so small that I seemed to have walked all the streets more than three times in two days. Every home has a B&B, and few people lock their doors – so in theory you can visit anyone’s home.

There are as many galleries as there are B&Bs, with large and small paintings hanging on the walls, and occasionally there are stunning works.

The sunrise and sunset, the moonlight and starry sky, cannot be completely recorded in photos, nor can they be completely described in words. Sitting on the stone steps beside the church and drinking Cuban beer, the sunset reflects the red clouds, the band plays, and the people After dancing salsa, it was completely dark after dinner. I went back to the rooftop of the B&B to sit in a rocking chair and listen to music. The breeze was blowing, the night was gentle, the moonlight illuminated half of the sky, and the other half could see sparse stars. The night sky was like a dome, as if it was about to hit people. Come.

Life without the Internet is very simple. You can go to bed early and get up early. It was still dark at half past six, so I climbed up to the rooftop and turned off the lights. The moon had already set, and I was surrounded by stars in the sky. Orion was clearly visible. Horses hoofs clatter, dogs bark, roosters crow from dozens of households in the neighborhood, and mountains and low-altitude clouds appear in the distance. When the morning star lit up in the east and faded into the morning light, the sky turned an unreal pink-blue color.

Then it’s breakfast time. I didn’t have a place to stay in Cuba for the next few days, so I asked the driver to take me to a B&B of an acquaintance. The old couple didn't speak English and I was the only guest in the hotel.

A diagonal tablecloth was laid out on the small rooftop, and omelettes and fresh fruits were placed, including guava, which had a crunchy texture, and hard snacks like peach cakes.

The hawker was selling bread along the street with a sack on his back. When he saw the landlord sticking his head out and buying two pieces, it soon turned into a basket of cut bread, coffee, hot milk, honey, and a big bunch of fresh vegetables on the table. Juice the mango.

The picture in the middle was eaten at an unidentified rest stop on the way. Roast pork sandwich is a common snack in Cuba.

The blue anchor is the symbol of the B&B, which is eaten in almost every house in Trinidad. Yes

Cigar Shop

Adventures

I was so busy with work before the trip that I only made a quick reservation for the first three nights and made a guide at the airport. During the trip, I discovered that airbnb reservations in Cuba cannot be made on mobile phones

(?_?) (you need to fill in extra information). Back then, in Lithuania, where there was no language barrier, no guide, and no internet, I thought it was a great adventure. Four years later, facing Cuba, which also has no strategy, no Internet, and is more incomprehensible in language (and seems to be more dangerous), I am still walking alone, more calm and composed, and my intuition and sense of the unknown are much more accurate than then.

Some of the things you eat in Cuba these days, even in high-end restaurants, are full of flies. You need to keep chasing them away while eating, while hinting to yourself that they have never crawled before

The one on the right is a local restaurant that we went to with the driver. It costs 2 dollars a plate. The pork is so soft and so delicious!

In Trinidad, the landlord showed me where to sit by gesticulating and drawing. To the small park where the bus goes to the beach.

The departure time is not fixed, the pick-up location is not fixed, and I don’t know what the bus looks like. After sitting there for two days, I really couldn’t figure out the logic and had to give up.

Inexplicably, I got into a shabby taxi without a seat belt. The driver didn’t know a word of English. He drove 90 yards on a suburban road and overtook several carriages.

It started to rain heavily as soon as I got in the car on the way back. I shook my handle for a long time and barely managed to roll the window up halfway. Then it started leaking from the broken car, with water droplets dripping from all kinds of unknown places. I kept driving while driving. Wiping the water on the windshield with a rag, there was rain and fog in front of me, but the speed of the car did not slow down (there was no seat belt!).

The driver gestured to take a detour to a neighboring town and drove to a local rural village. He stopped in front of a dilapidated building and yelled in Spanish. A woman came out and took away a few banknotes. Drive back to Trinidad.

On the way, the driver pointed out his own house to me. Water accumulated all the way, and from time to time water splashed half the height of the car. I was confused the whole time.

Cuban cola, frozen chocolate, Cuban beer

Two kinds of coconuts, iced lemonade from local stalls for a few cents a cup

Later, I met three people A strong Cuban man took a carpool back to Havana and lived in the area of ??23rd Street in Vedado, a new district. Ask the driver to get off the car at the intersection, take a screenshot of the Spanish translation such as "No reservations, rooms available tonight", follow the blue anchor B&B sign, find a house you like, and ring the doorbell. The B&B host was as surprised as she was when she encountered an uninvited guest who fell from the sky and didn't speak Spanish. She was just as surprised when she learned that I had to go to the airport at four o'clock the next morning with a verbal agreement to find a car on the street.

Havana’s food stalls, do you think I have eaten?

Havana’s local bus

23rd Street is close to the University of Havana, and there are many locals and students, and The old town has two different atmospheres. I checked in at Coppelia, one of the most famous ice cream shops in the world, and then got hooked on the local bus that no tourists would take.

I peeked at the passengers in front of me to buy tickets, one peso per trip. I didn’t know Spanish and didn’t know the route. I got on when I saw a bus coming. I looked at the GPS and felt that the route was going to deviate, so I got off. The feeling of not knowing where to go is very exciting.

That evening, I got on a bus at the entrance of the museum. Then the car drove across the bay and out of the city, and stopped at a seaside toll station. I took a shaky photo of the sunset beach, and then took another bus back to the city across the road.

It’s like eating the same thing as a local at a roadside stall, placing a handful of coins in your hand and asking the other person to pick out the correct amount; just like the driver of a black truck offering to come back to pick up another business;

Just like agreeing on the street that a taxi will pick you up at the agreed time and place; just like not following the established plan, there will be solutions to various situations.

After traveling to some places, I realized that traveling does not rely on homework and language, but on intuition and instinct. Rather than preparing everything in detail, I prefer to follow the laws of the world and listen to the sounds of the world half a world away.

Above.

(How to play is casual, please do not imitate easily, it is recommended to prepare a strategy and book the entire journey)

Air tickets/visas:

Mexican Airlines Shanghai-Mexico City- Havana, the return journey stops at Tijuana on the US-Mexico border. Common domestic departures include Aeroflot (transfer in Moscow) and Air Canada (transfer in Toronto).

Mexican transit requires customs clearance and a valid US visa or Visas from other mainstream developed countries are enough

You can buy a visa card on Taobao in advance on Taobao when traveling to Cuba. The materials are simple

Food and drink:

El Chanchullero, Havana: There is no English menu, but the pork ribs are delicious

Lamparilla Tapas & Cervezas, Havana: Grilled lobster and extra large cocktails for 15 dollars each

LaBotija, Trinidad: Cheap and plentiful tapas, wine The tune is very strong

La Bodeguita Del Medio: translated as the five-cent tavern, famous for mojito

El Floridita: translated as Little Florida, famous for daiquiri

Lodging:

There are very few hotels that can be booked in Cuba and they are expensive. You basically rely on B&Bs and airbnb to book or find them after landing

Nieves House, Vedado, Havana (Airbnbid14107435): The one I broke into on 23rd Street Homestay

Currency and prices:

There are two currencies: foreign currency (cuc) and Turkish peso (cup). The exchange rate of the former is similar to that of the US dollar. UnionPay cards can be accepted at all ATMs in Cuba. Withdraw cuc. Cuc can be exchanged for local cups at the bank, which can be used at roadside stalls. It is cheaper to use cups when dealing with some hawker drivers

B&B: 30-40 in advance, 20-25 when you arrive. Breakfast costs an additional ￥5

Transportation: Shared taxis from Havana Airport to the city cost NT$20, taxis in the city cost about ￥1 per kilometer, and intercity taxis cost about ￥25 per kilometer.

Eating :10-15, a glass of bartending 3-4