Hotel Havana Libre, Tuesday, April 5, 2005, 6:54 pm On Sunday, it was wonderful. The cold front has finally arrived, the rain was over and we had a beautiful day, warm and sunny, no humidity. My hostess is also a guide for the National Park System and Vinales is a protected natural habitats at national level. She took a tour through the side valley of Vinales (Valle del Ancon) with 3 participants, an elderly couple from Germany and I expected. The visit was wonderful, we picked up by a local taxi and took about 20 minutes outside the city, was released and attended a local primary school, which had several communist slogans painted on the outside. Political graffiti, pictures, and message boards are very common in Cuba. Although there is no western style advertising, there are many political slogans, a collection (some of which I have) will be merged at a later date. It is a very strange experience when you come from a Western capitalist country like Canada, then you see all these political slogans about Communism and defending the revolution. Truly fascinating indeed a completely different world. Were on our drive 3 hours, we walked through the fields on the local fauna is, especially birds (Tocororo Cuban Turkey vultures and other birds. We’ve also heard through the local agriculture or with human labor, manual plows and oxen. We introduced crops such as Malanga (pureed and given to babies), Yucca, various types of sweet potatoes, maize and sweet potatoes. A highlight was a 20 minute walk through a limestone cave through one of the hill Mogote. We saw some interesting rock formations, strange plants and even paler in the pitch black cave. Our guide had illuminated the cave with a powerful flashlight for the 4 of us, and it was a fairly easy walk to the cave dwellers with no animals in sight, just a political slogan spray-painted the cave (apparently a hideout for the revolutionary army at some point ..). After leaving the cave, we found ourselves in a small valley surrounded by mountains and uninhabited we ran into a local farmer for 60 years, whose face and body slim leather gave the appearance of a 80-year old man, evidence of many decades of sun and HARD WORK. He had) a flock of turkeys (with 61 young chick, a dog and some fields of corn and beans. And he usually gives most of his days working hand in this little valley, completely isolated, sometimes all night a hut made of wood and leaves of royal palm, Cuban national tree. No radio, no TV, no sanitation, no kitchen, just a wooden bed with a blanket in a hut with dirt floor. Again once a reminder of how life can be different in this country…. Then we crossed a small hill and back into the Valle del Ancon, where we saw a Casa Campesino, a traditional farm Museum, who also attended some years ago by Fidel Castro. In addition to the farm is a beautiful river, which floated at the exit of a cave and 3 young cuban teenage boys and jumped into the water and with great pleasure. The entrance to the cave is also surrounded by wasp-hives (if that word exists), there are tons of wasp dwellings hanging down from the rock formation. We returned by taxi to the city, and I still had 3 hours before I left the bus Viazul. 2 Teens Local Rider and Rigo, approached me (truly in the style of the underground economy), offered me a bike for $ 3 to rent and take me to a Paladar restaurant or private. I thought, why not, she seemed quite decent. So I took the 3rd bikes and went with them in the hills above Vinales. There I was with a local family, and the hostess served me a complete vegetarian meal for $ 8. 00. So I rented the bike for $ 2 for 1 hours and I rode around Vinales and outside of the city to take some photos of some of the hummocks. The bike ride, if she was also very short, a good way to explore the city and its environs. From 4 o’clock in the afternoon, I jumped on the bus back on Viazul and returned to Havana (Havana). Clock at 7.30 or so I came up with the bus station Viazul and I ended up having a “Cocotaxi”, a yellow 3-wheeler type of scooter taxi-boat with a rounded yellow roof partially during the 2 seats in the back and drivers. Cocotaxi The driver was initially set his vehicle since a tire had blown and he changed the wheels. The trip took about 20 minutes to the hotel and was an experiment. He inisted on the invitation for a drink and I told him once that I am not interested in any funny business I was a married woman, only here, in Spanish and not interested in studying romance. (Romantic approaches, which are of Cuban women and men of foreigners here very often). He said no problem, just wanted to talk and we sat down for a conversation that was very nice for a while until it starts to move me to make some very verbally explicit by path. I never felt physically threatened, especially since it is shorter than me, but I certainly anger against him and he apologized for his behavior at the end. However, the brief experience taught me to curb my friendship and frankness with some locals to stop, because things can not be easily understood in this culture. . . . Another lesson learned. . . . For the full story, including photos, see http://www. Trave land transitions. com/stories_photos/hello_cuba_3. htm

Technorati Tags: Cuba, Exploring, from, Hello, Hiking, Nature, Part, Vinales