Cublog(A cuban adventure)

Cuba pics!

Okay, so you guys are probably wondering where the hell I've been for the past week and a bit. No updates to the blog, and the last you saw of me, I was writing in pain from horse riding misadventures.

Well, the horse-riding thing was really a bad idea. My ankles, nearly two weeks later are looking quite ugly, and are not exactly fun to walk around with. Regardless, I soldiered on with my plan to carry on in Cuba, hoping that I could sort of work around the discomfort.

To try and aid the healing process, I made the extremely tough decision to go to the beach and just hang around there for a full day. The beach is about a 20 min coco-taxi ride from Trinidad, and I was there in a flash. Actually, the trip could have taken much longer, and I wouldn't have known, as I was doped up on antibiotics and really feeling quite out of it.

I spent the evening at Casa (something something) Musica - the hub of the local music scene. As I sat around downing Mojitos and drinking Cuba Libre, forgetting all about the sickening antibiotics I was on, I relaxed and enjoyed my time there.

The next day, I set out to Santa Clara, home of Che, to get ready for the Parandas festival that was on in a little town north of there. Getting the bill for my accomodation, I was a little shocked at how expensive my trip had been so far. My attempts to beat the Cuban tourism system had failed miserably. No matter though, it had been fun :)

The Casa that I stayed at in Santa Clara was run by a guy called Carlos, and his wife Rebecca. They were both really nice people - and I could see where the reputation of Cuban's being really nice comes from. I spent the first day in Santa Clara not doing very much really - just keeping off my feet as much as possible in the hope that my feet would automagically fix themselves up.

The night of the Parrandas festival - I was all set to head out and party. I had scored myself a cheap bus that would take me from Santa Clara and back again at about 4am. Total amount of worrying required - none! On the way to the bus though, things started going very very wrong. My stomach, possibly inspired by the proximity to the Che Guevara memorial, staged it's own personal revolution, and decided that it would have no part in any partying for the evening. I was literally about to walk onto the bus at this point of time. Talk about some terrible timing. I had to cancel my bus fare, and jumped on the nearest bici-taxi back to the Casa. I wasn't a happy chappy.

The stomach pain seemed to have all the symptoms of Giardia, and so I had to make a decision about what I was going to do for the rest of my time in Cuba. My feet were not making very much progress - still quite painful to walk around with, and now my stomach had decided to have a go at me too. My next destination had been the idyllic region of Pinar Del Rio, and in particular the town of Vinales. The only problem with that area though, was that it was really good for going hiking, which I figured that I wasn't in any position to do. So, given the cost of the journey so far - and doing a couple of back of coaster calculations - I would be really spending a bucketload of cash to stay in Cuba, whilst not getting very much out of it. I figured the best thing to do would be to grab a flight out, and see what I could do about recovering in Canada.

I'm disappointed that I had to cut the trip short - as anyone would be - but I will return to Cuba, where I shall stay away from horses, and possibly grab a car and drive around the country, a much better way to travel I think.

So, at the moment, I'm making use of the lavish facilities in the Maple Leaf lounge in Toronto Pearson international airport, after spending a week bumming around in Fenelon Falls (north of Toronto). My flight to London departs in about an hours time, and I didn't want to start on the Da Vinci Code yet. More updates when I get to London.