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.

Diving Part 1- The North Shore

April 23-24, 2017

I'll preface these next couple posts by saying that our knockoff GoPro worked very well, but some exposure setting was off and all the photos ended up washed out and badly exposed. They still give you the gist of what's going on, but I know they're not marvels of photographic genius.

Diving Day 1- Playa Coral
On our first day of diving we woke up in Matanzas, had breakfast, and then packed our bags to get ready for our guide to pick us up. When the car horn honked, we were met on the street by Danilo our guide, Leo our driver, and his seafoam and white '53 Plymouth which was as much a part of the group as the people.

Our drive down the beachfront was rather picturesque with palm trees and classic cars against the blue sky.

I got creative with the camera.

It was maybe 40 minutes in the car to reach Boca de Camarioca, a small fishing town we had a room booked in for the two nights we were diving on the north side. We got dropped at our room, a lovely little suite with its own kitchen, bathroom, bedroom, and sitting room with a table and sofa. We had an hour or so to relax before they returned to take us to the dive site.

Shoutout to the guy photobombing in the background

It was a shore dive that had blobs of coral in a plain of sand. Each coral rock had different fish, corals, and fronds to see, and it was easy to hop from one to another since they were 10-20 feet apart. We had two dives there with a nice shady surface interval in between. There were a couple buildings, souvenir shops, and a bar set up with the dive and snorkel place, so we had some pineapple juice too.

Back in Boca we had a quick shower off, then Danilo showed us around town. He is originally from there, so we got to explore where the locals go.

We wound up at a little ocean overlook drinking local beers with him. We enjoyed the breeze, watched the waves and some kite surfers, talked about living in Cuba and cultural differences with the states, why he started diving, all kinds of things. It was great fun to have a good talk and learn about him and about Cuba, while sharing things about the US too.

Before we walked back to the hotel for dinner he showed us the little hidden beach that was at the end of the block, so we got some sand between our toes for the day.

Our dinner was wonderful and made by our hosts at the hotel. We had breaded shrimp, salad, yucca, plantain chips, and a big plate of rice and beans. Plus ice cream for dessert. All in the comfort of our own little sitting room. We went to bed happy.

Diving Day 2- Puerto Escondido
Our second day we loaded into a beat-up pickup and headed west to the dive site for the day. We drove back through Matanzas and a little farther, and then went down a bumpy little road to an abandoned shore. Danilo told us that locals like to go camping there for the weekend.

It was nicer weather in Matanzas this time

We pulled up to a little cove with stairs going down to it.  Parked on the grass above we got set up for the dive.

Danilo found a full wetsuit for me to wear after the first day (I get cold so easily) and I ran down to float in the water while I put it on. It was maybe a size too small so it was a little bit of a struggle each time I took it on or off, but I was warmer.

It was easier to swim under the surf and the raft of seaweed in the cove rather than go through it, so we set out under 3 feet of water.

Puffer fish buddy!

My favorite part of the day was the swim-through near the end of the dive, which was filled with silvery hatchet-shaped fish.

Here's the youtube link, since it was too big to upload within the blog.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_qWFHWFFR8

We had a nice warm surface interval before the second dive.

After our second dive we packed the truck and drove back to Boca. We showered off, and then went to sit on the beach again and watch the sunset.

There was a kite surfer going back and forth by the shore we had fun watching.

Danilo met up with us for a short while on the beach, and we asked him for a restaurant recommendation for our last night. Somewhere good the locals go to eat. He told us Norbert's, on the other side of the bridge.

It was a beautiful walk over.

And when we arrived at the restaurant, we discovered that Danilo had failed to mention that along with good food it had a fantastic view.

We happily watched the last of the sunset from our second floor table.

Of course our last night wouldn't be complete without a piña colada and a mojito.

Our seafood was delicious, the drinks were good, the view was amazing and the waiter was cute. It was a great farewell to Boca de Camarioca. The next morning we set out for the southern side of the island to dive in the Bay of Pigs.