Monday December 1, 2014

Rain on the windows again. Breakfast is served between 7:00 and 9:30, we decided to get up and see what happened to the weather. By the time we had finished breakfast, the sun was fighting its way through the clouds. It looked windy but we figured we should carry on. It was a bit of an indecisive start to the day – should we cycle, should we relax. I knew if we had stayed another night I would have wanted to stay a third night because it would be my birthday and I could just veg out.

I am glad we eventually decided to make the move and head out. We had cycled to Banes once before. I knew it was going to be a hilly ride and hoped I was stronger than the last time I did it as I had to get of a couple of times on that occasion. We were riding bikes that we were going to deliver to the High School in Banes for their cycling club. “The Bikes for Cuba” organization collects old road bikes, all in good condition and sends them with tourists to the Holguin area, where they are distributed to youth who join the Banes cycling club. When we did this a couple of years ago, we asked Jeff the founder of this organization to allow us to ride the bikes for a week and then we would hand them over. We had a great week cycling the area and then cycled to Banes with the bikes, Jeff and Jorge (the Cuban coordinator) had arranged for the cycling club to join us part of the way and we had a great ride with these enthusiastic young cyclists.

I have become a stronger rider, even with all the weight on my bike, I didn’t get of at all, including the 11% grade hill. I set my self little targets in my head when I am struggling up a hill – I will get to where Ralf has just passed, o.k. still doing good, I will get to that lumpy bit of road, o.k. still doing good, I will get to the sign etc. and before I know it I am crossing the peak of the hill and hurtling down the other side.

We arrived in Banes at round noon time, one of the Cuban cyclists we had met last time we were here cycled alongside us and asked how we were. I recognized him and I told him who we were, we chatted for a while as we came into the Town Centre. I asked if he knew of a casa, he brought us to a nice casa with a small restaurant attached.

After doing our normal routine of cleaning the bikes (it had rained on our ride), showering, rinsing out the clothes we headed downtown. For some reason I was getting really irritated by the constant attention. Do you want cigars? Can you give me a dollar? Do you want peanuts? My Friend where are you from? I eventually came back to the casa where it is quiet and Ralf has gone out to investigate the Town.

Now I know where all the English books have gone from the hotels. Eduardo used to work at one of the hotels in Playa Pesquereo. He has a library of about 40 English books. He allowed us to choose a couple that we could take with us.

We are eating in the casa tonight and will have an early night, tomorrow is a longer day, but according to our cyclist friend, not too hilly. Only the first hill leaving town and then it should be fairly flat.

Jorge came to see us tonight, we had a great chat about what we have seen this time in Cuba and the many changes. We also talked about how well the Cuban cycling team has done at the Latin-American Games. We discovered that one of the mountain bike team is from the Banes area and was riding a donated bike! She came 8^th but was one of the youngest girls in her category.

Sunday November 30, 2014

We were going to get an early start this morning and set the alarm for 6:30am, we woke up to rain on the windows again. We did what any sane cyclist would do and that is turn over and go back to sleep.

The next time we woke up it had stopped raining and we got up and got ready to leave the wonderful casa. By the time we were ready to leave the clouds had moved in again and Iliana (casa owner) said that the forecast today was for rain and overcast. As we left it started to drizzle, by the time we got to the outskirts of Holguin, it had started to rain quite heavily again. At 11 kms I was wondering why we had left a wonderful casa, with an amazing shower to cycle in the rain.

We continued to cycle in the rain for the majority of the ride, which was a shame because the route had stunning scenery, and rolling hills. I wish we could have got some photos, because it really was very beautiful.

One of the necessities of a touring cyclists life is finding a public washroom. New Zealand had the most, followed closely by Australia and France. Cuba doesn’t have any and even the ones in the restaurant often leave a lot to be desired. It is often best to have a “wild wee”. Now I wouldn’t usually mention such a personal thing on the blog but today’s “wild wee” was a momentous occasion. As I mentioned, it had been raining and even though it was wet it was still warm and humid therefore you still have to hydrate which equates to having to find a public washroom or a wild wee. We had been cycling on a relatively quiet road and I figured that with Ralf standing guard I could have a quick wild wee without anyone seeing me. This is when it became a momentous occasion, not for me or though it was very embarrassing, but for the recently arrived tourists. The flight weary tourists that had recently been picked up from Guardalavaca airport to take them to their 5 Star resort in Playa Pesquarea saw my little white bum. It wouldn’t have been so bad if it had only been one bus, but no five tour buses in quick succession, I had nowhere to hide, although I was behind a bush, buses and their passengers tend to be able to see over the small bush that I was behind. Bus drivers honked and tour guides waved.

As we came into Guardalavaca, we were trying to decide whether to stay in a hotel (all inclusive) or a casa. We were wet and it was still raining. We both knew we wanted a good hot shower and knew that we were guaranteed a good shower at a hotel. We cycled up to the hotel we had last stayed at when we were last in Cuba. We checked in and managed to get our bikes in the room. Our clothes are drying in the bathroom, hopefully they will be dry by the morning.

As I was registering, Ralf chatted to people outside, who had stopped to enquire about the loaded touring bikes. When I had got my bags and bike in the room, I chatted to people whileRalf got his stuff to the room – teamwork. Fortunately no-one we talked to were passengers on the tour buses that passed us.

Unfortunately, this is the first room we have stayed in, that is a smoking room. It stinks of cigarette smoke.

This hotel is an all-inclusive hotel, which means that we do not pay extra for food or drinks. It is a little more expensive than staying in a casa but sometimes it is worth spending a bit extra for a guaranteed hot shower.

We had a wander around the resort grounds trying to find the “library”. Usually this is a small area in the hotel where people who have read their holiday books and leave them for someone else to read. Unfortunately there were no English books to be had. I still have some books to reread on the computer.

After dinner we chatted to the group of cyclists from London, Ontario. They had bought their bikes and were cycling routes from the hotel. We were all concerned about what the weather was going to be like tomorrow. Ralf and I have a short ride to Banes (37kms), they wanted to do a 100 kms or more.

It was nice staying at the hotel, but it was very noisy and we both realized that we may have got past staying at an all-inclusive resort. Unless of course when we get back to Canada we both decided to work at something stressful and needed a week to totally unwind and not have to think about anything other than whether we should have another pina colada or not. I don’t think that is going to happen – working at something stressful that is.

Saturday November 29, 2014

Another great nights sleep in our giant bed. The weather has changed and it is windy and cool, which also helps with a good nights sleep. We had cereal again with fresh pineapple, for breakfast, lovely.

I checked the email to see how my Dad was doing, as he was taken into hospital with chest pains a couple of days ago. He is back at home and has to have more tests.

Then we set of for the Loma de Cruz, (Hill of the Cross). There are 468 steps to the top and you get a stunning view of the City from there.

On the way Ralf took photos of street life in Cuba.

There are a lot of street vendors in Cuba shouting their wares –pina, pan etc. As I lay in bed this morning I heard the bread man shouting that he had fresh bread. It reminded me of that scene in the moviee Oliver where he is staying at the posh house and the street vendors are dancing in the street and singing the song “Who will buy my sweet red roses?” Of course the street we are staying on is not quite as picturesque as in the movie!

As we continued up the street towards the Loma de Cruz, we spotted the carts with the various fruits and vegetables, the local butchers and the green grocers store.

This young guy had this awesome cake, he seemed a bit concerned when I sat next to him.

We passed the local kids park and the rocket ride. Not sure these things would be allowed in Canada, the US or the UK – they would be banned as too dangerous.

We climbed the 468 steps to the top of the hill and chatted to an English couple who had also walked up.

They had decided to go down the same way by the steps, Ralf and I chose to go down by the road and took a short cut over the hill and through the local subdivision.

The street we are staying on has a tremendous amount of rubble. A lady told Ralf he shouldn’t be taking photos as it doesn’t look good on Cuba. Ralf said “This is life in Cuba. Ralf asked why there was so much rubble. Apparently there was a problem with people and children getting sick and having fevers – something transmitted by mosquitos. The Minister for Health in Holguin instructed everyone to get rid of their garbage, building rubble etc. and put it out on the streets and it would be disposed of by the City. The lady, Ralf was talking to, said there was no forethought or planning to it, it should have been done street by street. When one street had been cleared, the next street could dump their rubbish and that would be cleared and carry on from there. No, everyone put all their stuff out on the street at the same time and the City is getting around to picking it up one street at a time. In the meantime, it looks a right mess.

It is now 3:45 pm on a Saturday afternoon and the municipal workers have arrived to clear this street of the rubble. When was the last time you saw municipal workers working on a Saturday afternoon, unless it was to clear the snow.

Shortly after the municipal workers had done their job, the community stepped in to do the final tidy up. Sweeping the side walks and anything that the municipal workers could not pick up, was swept up.

Although we have stayed in a lot of casa this is the first time that we have stayed in a community and had to shop for ourselves. It has been interesting living in the community if only for a few days. We have shopped at the local stores for the food we have been cooking, we have really witnessed how the locals live, buy their food and watching the kids playing in a small park or playing on the street.

Holguin is a big City, it is not as pretty as other cities we have been to, but it does have an amazing bronze mural which depicts the landing of Christopher Columbus.

Friday November 28, 2014

What a great nights sleep. We woke up to the pattering of rain on the windows and outside patio. We turned over and went back to sleep for another hour. We had our breakfast cereal this morning and it made a nice change. We waited until it stopped raining and then we went out to update the Blog and have a little wander around. Today was a very relaxing day, nothing to do and not much to see.

Ralf’s merino wool cycling jerseys are giving up the ghost. My red one disintegrated in Spain. I bought a replacement top in Spain, which is for running (no pockets in the back) I have been wearing it every day and rinsing out at the casas. It has worked well for me. We spotted an Adidas store and popped in to see if we could get Ralf a replacement top. We bought him a high-vis (interpret that to read bright yellow) top, which is supposed to have sweat wicking capabilities. My new top cost EU 15, Ralf’s cost $21.00, bargain for both of them.

More importantly we found some WD40!!! I have been using the good oil for the chain, but for the pedals and other moving parts it is good to have some other oil and spotting WD40 was almost as exciting as having the awesome shower yesterday.

One of the things we still cannot get used to is the appalling service in Cuba. There are times when we just shake our heads and suck it up. We have been using some electrolyte powder called Turbo, but you cannot always find it in the stores. Today we spotted it in a store and we lined up to get it. Then something went wrong at the cash, the only person on the cash started checking on the box of cookies. She checked every package in the box, checking them against the sheet of paper she had. In the meantime the line-up got longer (I was third in line), she totally ignored the line-up and continued with checking the cookies. We hadn’t seen the Turbo for a couple of days and had run out, we knew from past experience in Cuba when you spot something you need to line-up and get it. Eventually after about 15 minutes another woman arrived and took over the cash and started to deal with the now diminished line up because other people had returned their purchases to the shelves and left. I stuck it out to the end and bought every single package of Turbo they had (40 packages) – it should last us until we leave.

Then we went into the next grocery store and there Turbo was again, then the next grocery store and there it was again. Ralf figures the word had gone around that there was 2 crazy Canadians buying up the Turbo and better get it out on the shelves.

Our evening meal was at a nice looking Cuban restaurant and was quite busy, always a good sign. Unfortunately, the service left a lot to be desired and we had to send the rice and the plantain fritasback as they were cold. There was no “I am sorry”, just a sigh and back to the kitchen. O.k. we only spent the equivalent of $4.50 for 2 porkescalope’s, rice, tomato salad, fried plantains, one glass of wine and a pina colada, plus a bit of aluminum foil in Ralf’s pina colada (that was free).

We met a Canadian cyclist today in a cafeteria. He has cycled in Cuba but always staying at a resort and doing day trips around the resort. We told him about our ride around Cuba. He would like to do some touring cycling and asked us a lot of questions about our bikes, equipment etc. His only issue is finding someone to do it with, he is a social guy and needs company. We told him about warmshowers, maybe he will get inspiration from visiting cyclists.

Although Holguin is not as pretty as other cities, we have decided to stay an extra day. Tomorrow we will go up to the top of the “Loma de Cruz” – Hill of the Cross, you can get a great view of the city from there, we will have another relaxing day and then head out to the coast again and towards Baracoa.

Thursday November 27, 2014

Both Ralf and I didn’t have a good night sleep. We thought we were going to sleep well with the door open and a nice breeze from the ocean. We set up our mosquito net, to protect us from any bugs, but it was hot and uncomfortable. We are used to sleeping in a king sized bed, when we are sleeping in a small double bed and it is hot, it is really uncomfortable for us.

There is a fort in Puerte Padre, which we visited yesterday, but couldn\’t get a good photo of because of the sun.  It is undergoing renvoations, but the curator allowed us in for a quick look.

We set of early at 7:45 and the first 20 kms were on a good road, the weather was warm but we had a little bit of cloud cover. Then it started to rain, the first rain we have had in three weeks. It didn’t last long but the bikes got covered in road dirt and so did we.

We came passed the local bus terminal and were fortunate to see the \”\’Inter-Town buses\” and the local \’buses\”.

The roads became rougher as we got further away from any major Town. We started to go through more rural areas of sugar cane and started to climb into the hills. As we climbed we both commented on the lovely scenery – lovely scenery but we have to climb hills.

We made one wrong tur today and found ourselves in quite a large town with a steel works.

Ralf was close to bonking, not enough food yesterday at lunch, and a normal size meal at the restaurant. He said he was just feeling weak. I had eaten more of the peanut bars than Ralf and wasn’t feeling too bad, but I really needed to eat when we got into Holguin.

We arrived in Holguin and I spotted the street that the casa was on that Oscar had told us about. It was on the outskirts of the Town and we always want to be close to the centre, I didn’t tell Ralf about it. We got to the first of the five parks that make up Holguin and asked a bicycle taxi where the centre of Town was – he said two more parks. We carried on and when we got to the main square we spotted a casa sign. Unfortunately there was no room, but the owner called another casa and we went in search of that one. It didn’t have the official casa sign and the rooms were on the first floor with a steep set of stairs to carry the bikes up. We spotted another casa down the street, it was a lovely green colour. We cycled to that and Ralf asked if she had any rooms, she asked if he was married, he said we were and she showed us the room. Acutally she showed us the apartment. We have the run of the upstairs of the house which includes the kitchen, sitting room, patio, balcony, a large bedroom and a bathroom with a shower that I could stand under for an hour.

I never thought I would actually look forward to cooking but I really was getting fed up of pork and chicken. After showering and washing the bikes of the road crap, we went out and bought pasta and sauce with olives- menu meal # 1. We also bought some breakfast cereal which we are looking forward to having. Makes a change from eggs every day for the past month.

After we had bought our staples for dinner and breakfast, we decided we needed some bread buns to go with dinner. Finding bread at 4:30 in the afternoon is pretty hard. I asked a couple of people where there is a bread shop. We were directed down a few streets but I couldn’t see the sign for panaderia, so we resigned ourselves to having dinner with no bread. However, we spotted a couple of people with buns in their bags, we spotted the store they were coming from and recognized it to be a ration store. I went and asked if they had bread. One lady showed her ration book, the guy behind the counter asked if we needed buns and I said yes, he gave me 4 buns and we asked how much they cost. We needed a ration book and as we didn’t have one, we got the buns for free.

All Cubans get a certain amount of food each month. They get a book which allows them about 1 kg of rice, beans, a bottle of vegetable oil, flour, sugar, eggs, milk, butter, bread and some meat.

As we were walking back to the casa Ralf said that we had probably deprived someone his daily ration of 4 buns.  They were good buns.

We had a lovely meal and hopefully will have a good nights sleep.

Wednesday November 26, 2014

A great ride today. We left the carrerrata and headed north to Peurta Padre. We weren’t fighting the wind and the road was really good. There were some sections that were quite rough, but because it was a quieter road we could alternate which side of the road we were cycling on. It is another hot day, the forecast was for a high of 33 degrees.

We arrived in Puerta Padre at 11:30 we made really good time. We had a recommendation from Oscar for a casa but nobody was home. There was another on the waterfront, we had spotted so we went back to that. We have a view of the ocean and the breeze coming through the room cooled us down nicely.

We went for a walk through the town and had something to eat. We watched the local old guys play dominos and ARRG wanted to play. The old guys didn’t want him to play, but allowed him to watch.

It was really hot so we came back to the casa and sat on the upstairs balcony and relaxed.

We had picked a place for our evening meal that was a fish restaurant about 500 metres from the casa. We had an evening stroll along the waterfront and noticed the restaurant was open. We came back to the restaurant and asked for the menu – “No menu”.   “We would like to eat dinner” “No – no food until tomorrow”.

Ralf and I shook our heads, why open a restaurant if you have no food, a fridge full of beer and rum, but no food and tables fully set.

We asked where we could eat, she gave us directions, but it seemed to be down the back alleyways of Puerta Padre. We made our way to the main street again, the sidewalks had been rolled up and all that was open was a pizza café. Ralf asked one of the bicycle taxi drivers if there was a restaurant where we could eat – well he actually mimed the question. The taxi driver said he would take us, so off we went down the back alleys and found a lovely little restaurant that served excellent food and had the best waitress service, she even said I spoke good Spanish! Our taxi driver asked what time to pick us up. We told him an hour and he was waiting for us after our meal.

We had a good day.

Tuesday November 25, 2014

Another horrendous days riding. I think we had about 10 kms of good roads, the rest was rough and narrow. Both Ralf and I were complaining about the road, how you can call this a main road, I have no idea.   Of course the constant wind didn’t help either.

We arrived in Las Tunas and checked the casa that Oscar had recommended. It was about 3kms out of the downtown area and no place to store the bikes. We decided to head out to the hotel, another 5kms. When we got to the downtown area of Las Tunas we spotted a pink casa with 5 stars! Their own evaluation of the casa not something that Michelin would assess.We stopped and checked it out, it was clean, with good air conditioning, fan and a safe place for the bikes.We chose to stay here so that we can update the blog while we are in the Town centre and enjoy the Town. Rather than be out of Town at a hotel.

I updated the blog in a cyber café (still controlled with the Exctra cards) and Ralf went for a wander around.

We noticed a large police presence and army presence in the Town. Much larger than in any other town that we have been in. Apparently, Las Tunas is known for its prostitution and black market goods.

After the blog update we went for a drink and met two English men from Leicester and South Yorkshire who had married Cuban women. We chatted to them for a couple of hours, it was very interesting to hear that they had been coming to Cuba for years and had also seen the changes.

We noticed the bar had wi-fi – first time ever in Cuba. We thought we might be able to update the garmins on the website. We went back to the casa and picked up the laptop and the garmins. Unfortunately we were unable to connect to the Garmin website to update our routes, but we were able to check out the American Adventure Cycling website. I think if we can get on a wi-fi website again we might be able to order the maps we need for the southern tier.

We chatted to a Native American (Navaho) who has family in California, and has a “significant other” and a daughter in the Town.

We went to a nice restaurant for dinner and spoke to an Austrian who comes here regularly and really enjoys Cuba but is concerned about the changes that he has seen over the last few years.

It was interesting talking to other tourists today. Most of them have houses here and spend time with their Cuban family as well as living in their own countries. The Austrian was the only one who didn’t have family here.

Monday November 24, 2014

An early start this morning as it was going to be a long ride due to there not being anywhere else to stay until Guiamaro (80 kms). We had a good breakfast and were on our way by 7:45, we managed to escape the busy city of Camaguey in quick time. The carrerata for the first 50 kms was a good well paved road. After 50 kms it became its usual bumpy self and the last 10 kms were really rough. Not only was the road rough but the temperature soared to 32 degrees, with the hotwind, it rose to 36 degrees.

We came through one small town and stopped for some cold pop and lunch. Unfortunately, she had sold out of cheese sandwiches. They had one other choice which turned out to be hotdog. I didn’t risk it and Ralf fed the dog half of his. An older guy flirted with me and gave me a flower.

With 20 kms still to go we stopped of at a gas station for some sandwiches and more cold pop to cool down and then finished the ride.

We stopped at the Guaimaro gas station to check where the casa was and discovered we didn’t have an address for one. There was a casa opposite the gas station but a fella came out of the gas station and said the owner wasn’t there, but he knew of a casa nearby. He hopped on his bike and we followed him to a very nice clean casa. The owner speaks English, which is nice, because sometimes I have no clue what they are saying as some of the Cubans can speak really quickly.

After we had settled in we wandered down to the main street. I found the Internet office and bought two cards, unfortunately they were about to close, I couldn’t check the email.

We tend to forget that there was the are of Independence before teh Revolution.  This square commemorated the names of Independence.

We stopped of and had a beer, and watched a dog wander up to a puddle of water near the gutter. She sniffed the water and decided it wasn’t drinkable, but she plopped herself full length into the puddle to cool down.

We chatted to a Mexican fella who has lived in Chicago for 35 years. He is now retired and had planned on going back to Mexico to live but said it was too dangerous. He is looking at moving to Cuba, he finds it very safe and relaxing.

It is still hot and the air conditioner in the room is only managing to cool half of the room and is incredibly noisy.

The heat and humidity have created a nasty heat rash again on my legs. The rash had gone after three days in Camaguey, but is back after our 80 kms ride today.

Tomorrows ride is only 45 kms. We are still going to have an early start. Hopefully I can get connected to theinternet office and update the blog.

Usually the casa owners ask us if we want dinner and breakfast. This lady was about to leave to go back to work, so I asked about dinner. She said we could eat at the casa. I wasn’t sure whether we could cook our own food or whether she would cook for us. After our wander around the town Ralf went into the small shop where she worked, to confirm that she would be cooking. Yes she would cook for us but only had pork. I guess we could have decided to eat at the restaurant in town, but we probably would have eaten pork there anyway.

Sunday November 23, 2014

Two and a half days to discover Camaguey. Not quite, as we had the business of cleaning bikes, washing, banking and updating the blog to do as well. Camaguey is the capital city of Camaguey province. The city was founded in 1514 by the Spaniards. The city has a labyrinth of streets that were designed to discourage pirates. The streets, alleys and abundant plazas make Camaguey’s urban layout unique in the country.

There is one straight street in Camaguey, the rest go off on tangents in a spiders web of streets and alleyways. Most of them end up in a park or plaza, where there is either a church or bar or both.

Some of the buildings have incredibly stunning architecture and others as in other Cuban cities are run down. A lot of money is being spent in Camaguey on the streets, the hotels and the buildings.

We spent a good part of yesterday and today wandering the streets and alleyways. We went into one colonial house to see the frescos on the walls. There was one room set aside to show the diversity of religions in Camaguey. There is a small Jewish area, past the train station, which was too far for us to walk.

We peer into houses and doorways as we wander around – No transmissions in the bathroom please, but how about your car in the front living room.

One of the claims to fame are the tinajons, they are large earthenware pots used to hold water. It is said if you drink water from one of these pots you will always return to Camaguey. Needless to say we didn’t partake of the water.

It is hot work wandering around a city, we could have taken a bicycle taxi, but enjoy going own alleyways, where we find things like this.

Colourful bike taxis in Camaguey.

We got back to the casa after a wonderful coffee and cake and had a siesta. Tonight was an early night as tomorrow may be another tough day on the carrerrata. We ate in the same restaurant as last night, the service in some restaurants leave a lot to be desired but the food was good at this one. It would be nice for us to have eaten at the same time though. On both nights Ralf got his food first and was almost finished eating before I got mine. Usually he would wait until I got mine but the waitress said mine would be another five minutes.

Saturday November 22, 2014

A good lie-in this morning, we had breakfast at 8:30 am. After breakfast I proceeded to clean the bikes. Ralf had asked Jorge yesterday if it was o.k. to clean the bikes and he was expecting Ralf to do them. I explained I did it, then told him Ralf’s bike was 10 years old. Good maintenance has kept it looking good.

It took me a couple of hours to get both bikes looking good and oiled. Ralf came back from lining up at the bank and the Internet office and tightened all the nuts and bolts on the bikes. They should be good to go on Monday.

It took Ralf one and a half hours to go to two banks, and pick up a USB drive from the telephone office. They didn’t have any internet cards, a city this size and they run out of internet cards.

I was able to check my email and the bank accounts but unfortunately I was only able to update two days of the blog.

We had a little wander around the City and found a nice Chinese/Italian place to eat. After we had eaten we walked down the main commercial street and back to one of the squares where a band was setting up to play. We stopped at a little bar and had a couple of mojitos and watched the show, Cuban music and dancing, similar to what we would see at the all-inclusive resorts.

We were back at the casa for 10 pm and chatted to the owners for a while.