January 2, 2015 Trinidad Rest Day for Me – Ride for Ralf

I got up with Ralf and had breakfast with him, then I went back to the casa and packed up my panniers and bike and moved it over to Vera’s casa. I went out to update the blog and search for cheap bottles of water. In Trinidad there is a price for tourists and a price for residents. The smaller bottles should be 0.45 cents, for tourists they are 1 CUC. The big bottles should be .70 cents for tourists they are 1.50 CUC. The big bottles are not to be found. I went in several shops and eventually found a small Cuban shop which had a case of the small bottles. I asked how much for the case, he said it was for Cubans and told me where to find a shop to buy the water. I explained to him that there was one price for Cubans and one price for Tourists. He said no the price of the small bottles should be 0.45. I assured him that there were different prices for tourists and Cubans, but only in Trinidad, nowhere else in Cuba had I paid more than 0.45 cents. His colleague went outside, looked up and down the street and came back and nodded. Very quickly I had a case of water put in my bag and I paid the Cuban price. He should not have sold me the water as I was in a store for Cubans, which is why he checked the street to make sure there was no police around.

Ralf’s blog for his ride

Up at 0645 to pack panniers, and take them over to Vera’s Casa, breakfast at 0730. On the road by 0825, and the temperature is already 24 degrees. I would have preferred to be on the road by 0730, but with staying at one Casa and eating at another, it had to do. Leaving Trinidad I made one wrong turn, stopped, and asked a cop for directions, who set me straight. There was 800 meters extra I didn’t want on a 44 kilometer hilly day.

I knew it was going to be a 21 k ride up hill from the turn off from the Central Carretera, with lots of switch backs, tight turns and narrow road. I also knew that it was going to be a steep ride, 900 metresof climbing! I didn’t know that the first 7 k’s were at 14 to 16 degrees, on average.

I passed the spot that Jacky and I turned around at seven years ago, so far so good. But, another few minutes along, I had to get off, take a breath and walked a bit. At the 7 k mark there is a Mirador (look out point), the elevation was 578 meters, and I was 1 hour and 15 minutes into the ride.

I stopped had a cold drink ate some bananas and let a tarantula walk on my hand. It’s just what you do, right!

At the top of the Mirador I met up with some Canadians from Orillia, just up the road from Barrie. They had both been to Cuba many times, but like Jacky and I visited different areas each time. He cycled around Orillia, but, wasn’t too sure about what I was doing. A French couple also wondered what I was doing, so the Grand Adventure story gets told. The French couple were from Provence and living in Quebec for two years, working, but also travelling through out Canada.

Some people take excursions to get here. They use 5 ton trucks.

Time to get moving, out of the parking area and hurtled into the next valley, -14 degrees descent. That’s all well and good, but I have to come back this way. That’s always the problem for me, the out and back rides, because you see what it’s going to be like on your return.

Two more valleys, but, this time the road surface has changed from paved to pouredconcrete with chip rock and it was ribbed, so the trucks and cars can get better traction when the road is wet. The ride up and down the valley wasn’t that bad, on average it was an 8 degrees ride for the next 9 kilometers.

It took me two hours to reach Topes De Collantes, elevation 787metres, with 938 meters of climbing over a 21 k distance. I spent some time at the top, bought more water, now comes the pay off.

Not so fast! The chiprock, the switch backs and the uneven road surface would make sure I did a controlled descent until I reached the Mirador, OK no more than 30 k’s an hour. When I passed the Mirador and was riding on pavement, all I had to watch for was switch backs, max speed 62 k’s.

As I said earlier, two hours to get to the top (Ev 787, 938 meters of climbing, avg: 14/16 degrees). Coming down, however only took 48 minutes. So I’m an adrenaline junky, what can I say. It was a great finish to an otherwise hard ride. Total climbing 1275 meters.

Back to Me

Once Ralf had got back safe and sound we went to eat and had a relaxing afternoon in Vera’s casa. The bedroom has a modern air conditioning unit and is lovely and cool and quiet.

We planned our route out of Trinidad and had an early night.