La Habana vieja or old Havana is one of the biggest sights in Cuba. In most cases, the capital is the first encounter with the island and immediately represents a leap back in time. This is the place where oldtimers are waiting at the traffic lights or where you can make a tour through La Habana vieja with one of …
Cuba is a dream vacation for many tourists. Because communism is still very active here it’s sometimes difficult to know how easy it is to arrange a vacation to Cuba. I have to admit that I was a little anxious when traveling to this country, but once you get there everything really works out. Cuba is a vast and diverse …
After I had a huge breakfast everyone was still asleep. I decided to explore the city on my own, as I didn’t do that yet and it was already my last day in this romantic village. Personally, I found Trinidad to be one of the nicest towns. Partly because it was so small, partly because it was so authentic. Once you …
Me and my new backpacker friends were dropped off first. Our backpacks were hoisted off the roof and we paid six CUC per person to the friendly driver. This casa was a lot better than the previous casa’s we had had. The man told us that the normal price was 10 CUC per person, but because we were friends of Magnolia …
My two girl companions seemed to think exactly the same, since they seemed to be anxious about their luggage dropping off the moving van. In the vehicle, two other girls were already seated. Since we were only with five (plus the driver and one of his co-workers), I was sure that more people would be crammed in later on. The …
Because you have no internet in Cuba, you can not really plan anything in advance and so our ‘Casa mama’ from Havana, Magnolia, called her friend who had a casa particular in Viñales to see if she still had free rooms. The Casas particulares in Cuba are very popular. They are, in fact, bed and breakfasts that are owned and operated by …
Before we left we tried to first buy a bottle of water, because it’s really important that you stay hydrated in this hot and humid place. The funny thing is that we found more stores where you could buy rum or other alcoholic beverages than shops that sold water. Because of the communist system in this country, it was often very …
In Cuba, there are two currencies. One for the tourists and one for the locals. The tourist currency is not exchangeable anywhere in the world, besides Cuba: the CUC or Cuban Convertible Pesos. The standard rule is that one dollar equals one CUC. But Cubans are still not really best friends with the Americans, and therefore there are all kinds of appraisals and additional …
