Trinidad de Cuba

April 26-27, 2017

Nestled at the edge of the Escambray mountains sits Trinidad- colorful, colonial, and busting with live music and tourists. After rinsing off from our last day of diving, it was our destination.

When we first arrived, Danilo did us a solid and helped us find a place to stay before heading home. We hadn't booked before before we left, and due to the distinct lack of wifi hadn't been able to do so during our trip as we had planned. But it worked just fine, and we ended up in a cute little house at the edge of town, outside the main tourist area.

We took a shower and a siesta, and a late afternoon wandered into town to explore for the evening. Trinidad is adorable.

The streets are cobblestone, the buildings are colorful, and the roofs are red clay tile.

Just down from our hostel was a lovely old church.

The camera angle makes it look like it's just a facade but there was depth to the building.

Sunset that night was beautiful over the main square. Dinner consisted of juice and a sandwich at a little hole-in-the wall that ended up having a rooftop patio, and we listened to the sounds of tourists and live music below in the square. We decided to leave the revelry to them for the night, and headed for our beds.

The next morning we woke up ready for our adventure day.

We started by walking directly out of town on the road that I hoped was the right one based on things I had looked up and written down in my planning journal, but not with quite enough detail to be sure we were doing the right thing. Our intended destination-a pottery workshop supposedly 850m off the map. We set out walking, and did manage to find it, the workshop hidden behind a big steel gate. There was a gallery as well as an area where about 4 guys behind pottery wheels were busy working on bowls in various stages. We didn't find anything we couldn't live without, but we had a good time watching.

Once back in town, we wandered the shops for a bit and then went to the main church. It's a sunny yellow like one of my favorite churches in Granada, Nicaragua. Plus, there was a group of old guys singing 'Guantanamera' outside in the square, which just made it even more perfect.

Inside, in the courtyard, was a small museum about revolutionary times, lots of  pictures of Fidel and Che, and a jeep and boat from the time.

The belltower was the big attraction. We paid our dollar to climb three stories up a rickety wooden staircase, and the view from the top was totally worth it.

Trinidad sprawled before us in all it's red-roofed glory

The massive bells hanging on several levels as well as a the top were pretty cool, and I'm sure they were original too.

Selfie from the deck halfway down

In the center of town there is a giant staircase they refer to as the Casa de la Musica. At night the bottom is roped off and live bands perform on the stage halfway up.

We stopped by after we left the church but before we went to our room to rest before dinner. We sat in the shade at a table and listened to a salsa band play our favorite Latin pop hits live while the pianist made eyes at us.

youtube link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0w2_jYIwsA

It was our last night in Trinidad so we splurged on dinner. We had both independently thought that the restaurant on the corner of the main square looked good, no matter what the menu was, so we went there. Easy choice.

We had a balcony table with a great view of the square and the sunset. There was a son (type of Cuban music) band playing in the courtyard below us and we had a front row seat for that too.

Doesn't she look pretty

Shay had spicy shrimp, I had lobster skewers. Yes, my plate was about 18 inches tall. And I confirmed again that I much prefer a well cooked shrimp to lobster, but it was good in any case.

Yes, it's three skewers shoved into half a pineapple as a base, and yes, we did eat the majority of the pineapple by the end of the meal. Garnish smarnish.

After dinner we paid our dollar to get into the Casa de la Musica. It was full with people, and became more packed as the night went on. We managed to get chairs, but missed out on a table.

It's difficult to tell since the photo is so dark, but there were people packed in sitting on the stairs all the way to the top

We spent a couple happy hours sipping cheap drinks provided by the roving waiters, and listened to the band. It was a 13 piece son band, and was great. They had multiple singers, percussion, and a full brass section.

youtube link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ukx6LFwU2ss

We got a kick out of the power stance the guajiro player had going.

Just look at it.

The second act was a group of traditional dancers, and we stayed for two dances before heading for bed.

Overall, Trinidad was way more touristy than the places we had been previously in Cuba, but I'm glad we visited. We had a great time, and got more Cuban culture and muisc.

Also I enjoyed the fact that this sign was not out of the ordinary.

After Trinidad we headed back to Havana for a couple nights to wrap up our adventure. We were not disappointed. Havana brought more music, an old fort and cannons, a theater performance, old cars, and a dance party in an alley on our last day.

Diving Part 2- Bay of Pigs and Cienfuegos

April 25-26, 2017

Read about our first two days of diving here.

Day 3- Bahia de Cochinos

On Day 3 we set out with Danilo and Leo in the Plymouth headed south across the island to the Bay of Pigs.

Cuba wouldn't have felt complete if the car didn't break down at least once, and we weren't disappointed. After a short stop to grab a snack, the car refused to start again. We abandoned Leo with the Plymouth and all piled into the second car we had with us (there was another couple that joined us that day) and he caught up later once it was fixed.

Along the way there was a stretch of road where crabs were smashed everywhere. Danilo told us that time of year they come from the forest down to the water to lay their eggs, and the road is in the way. So we were swerving around crabs down the whole stretch of road. They can puncture tires so its better to try to miss them.

read 'heyy, heyyy' in the voice of the crabs from Finding Nemo

They have CRAZY eyes

When we reached the Bay of Pigs, it was picturesque.

Hopping into crystal clear water, we headed out towards the drop off.

At the end of the first dive we had a wreck to explore, which is one of my favorite parts of diving.

Out of the murk it came looming

Danilo told us it was a fishing boat, I don't think it was purposefully sunk for a reef, but he didn't say anything about why it sunk.

The pilot house had an open top so we could swim through the door and then exit through the roof.

We gave our best underwater Titanic impressions.

In between dives we ate fresh mango that Danilo bought from a stand on the side of the road. Mango isn't typically my favorite, but these ones were delicious. Mango *is* Shay's favorite, so she was blissed out eating it.

The second dive was as pretty as the first.

Stoplight parrot fish

We found a big ol' barracuda hanging out by the bottom

We drove to Cienfuegos for that night, and checked rooftop sunset in Cuba off the bucket list.

Danilo and Leo had their rooms in the hotel right next to ours, and their facilities were deemed better than ours for rinsing off all the dive gear. Turns out the sink was up on the roof, so we hauled the box of dive gear up along with a couple beers and enjoyed the evening.

Sunset was beautiful.

We took a stroll around town at dusk and walked through the main plaza. There were at least three different soccer games were going on which had three different age brackets of kids with or without shirts and shoes.

There were some really pretty buildings and statues in the square.

Jose Marti has statues everywhere in Cuba. Cienfuegos was no different.

Then after a nap and a shower we fancied ourselves up and headed out on the town.

All fancied up with nowhere to go

We cruised down the malecon in our Plymouth (which we discovered had green underglow on the tires) feeling like a million bucks. Cienfuegos has a little peninsula that sticks out into the water full of night life and fancy houses. We sat on the seawall people watching and enjoying the lights across the water.

Then we dropped the car back off at the hotels and walked a couple blocks to a club. Even though it was around 10:30, it was evidently still early since no one was dancing and everyone was just sitting around in the heavily air conditioned room with their drinks.

Eventually people started dancing though, and we got some Cuban salsa in. There was also a performance from a dance troupe at one point. Here's the video I took:

[Note: the sound quality is horrible since it was so loud. Please turn down whatever speaker system you are using prior to clicking the link.]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O0DLQPp8G-4&feature=youtu.be

We put away our fair share of beers too, though Danilo and Leo had the majority of them. At one point this was our little table, filled with empty Cristal cans.

We had a fantastic night out on the town, and did get some sleep that night, even if we were a little blurry eyed in the morning.

Day 4- Guajimico
Our last dive site was Guajimico, a bit east from Cienfuegos. On the drive there we got a good view of the Escambray mountains where Fidel Castro hid out during the revolution.

Our dive site was at a little resort in a cove.

We had two 'boat dives' which ended up being us going out in a rowboat to where we started the dives from. Danilo had the day to rest and our dive master was Sander

Again with the washed out photos. Sorry...

We had two fun wall dives, saw some bigger fish and a giant lion fish on the last dive, though we had left the camera on shore so we have no photo evidence.

Since we were at a little resort we took a dip in the pool and lounged on pool chairs during our surface interval.

After peeling my wetsuit off for the last time we went an hour farther to Trinidad where we said thank you and goodbye to Danilo, Leo and the Plymouth. It was a short and sweet goodbye, and armed with great memories from the first half of our trip we set out to explore by ourselves for the rest of it.