Day Trip to Vinales

Hold on to your bootstraps--this is a long one.

Today was our day trip to Vinales--a rural valley west of Havana about 2 hours.  We had a 7:30am departure, luckily we had decided to take it easy the night before.  Our tour guides were great, the bus driver was great also, I wouldn't want to drive a full size tour bus on those mountain roads.

For awhile we were on the main 'interstate' of Cuba.  Four lanes, but, like everything else, a bit dilapidated.  Not many cars, but different traffic sources coming from horse carts, oxen carts, loose farm life wandering about.

Not much traffic.

Very common sight.

Accident.  I think it involved a motorcycle and a palm frond.
Not kidding. Not kidding at all.

We took a short rest stop at a government run rest area.  Very nice, with a bar/coffee shop (of course), gift shop and restrooms.  It was also a bit staged with the neighboring farmer bringing out his livestock.  I'm sure to show how the rural folk live--quaint nevertheless.  

Time to take the pig for a swim!

Cuban barn.

We stopped first at this awesome little hotel that has an overlook over part of the Vinales area. It would have a great place to stay for a few days, lots of things to do based from the hotel. 

Psst. Watch out, the KGB are here.

Vinales is where they tried to grow grapes for wine at one time.  It didn't work out, the wine was crap.  So, now other crops are grown there, mainly tobacco and done in a very traditional way-as in, not farm implements, but by hand. The orginal tobacco farmers came from the Canary Islands.  Geographically, the place is beautiful. With unique limestone cliffs and mountains.  

Our next stop was the cave-Cordillero de Guaniguanico which runs completely throughout La Sierra Guasasa.  The cave starts out with a bar (surprise!) and at the other end is a recreation of a Palenque de los Cimarrones.  Escaped slaves merged with the local Taino Indian population.

Not quite the Budweiser Clydesdales, but she'll do.

I have to hand it to some of our group who partook of the bar in the morning.
I guess Tim and I haven't been sailing long enough yet.

Sculpture in the cave.
Designed to scare the crap out of you. (or at least me)

Recreation of the settlement with dancing and singing.

Another sculpture showing slave rebelling.

From the Palenque we walked down to a tobacco farm where we got a tour of the growing/drying and rolling of the cigars.  80% of the farmers crop goes to the state, the other 20% he makes his own artisanal blend from by soaking the leaves in a mixture of coffee, vanilla, cinnamon and other spices.  All of which he grows on the farm.

Drying of the leaves.

Outside of the drying shed.  Completely made from palm fronds.

The tobacco here was hand harvested. He has a small knife on his thumb.

Me being an asshat, takinga  picture of the Cruising World photographer John
taking a picture of momma cow.  Momma cow was not happy and had already
started stomping her feet.  I was hoping to get a picture of him being
chased by the cow.
(I told John this story later-he laughed)

Rodents Of Unusual Size. aka Hutia. aka dinner most likely.
Bonus points if you got the Princess Bride reference.

Pressing fresh juice from the sugar cane for drinks.

Nice. That's all I got.

Small banana grove.

Our tobacco farmer. 
Or somebody called up from central casting. You decide.

Besides the ubiquitous cattle, chickens, dogs and cats, they also had some very large rodents called Hutia in a cage.  The tour guide said they were pets, but I researched that later and I'm pretty sure they were going to be dinner (and why not?).  Cubans are not allowed to raise cattle for beef--they are used for the production of dairy products, only very few have the license to raise beef for consumption.  Even then, I think a lot of the beef comes from other countrie

After visiting the tobacco farm we went back to the village of Vinales to have lunch at the Finca Agroecologica El Paraiso.  A family run restaurant in which every menu item (except fish) is grown on their farm.  Everything is completely organic, no pesticides or chemical fertilizers.

In a word. Delicious.  Simply the best meal hands down we had in Cuba.  There was plenty of it.  Everything is served family style with what is ready to go that day.  We had root vegetable stew, 3 different salads, 2-3 appetizers, the ubiquitous rice and beans, plaintains, chicken, pork fish and flan for dessert. Also included is their special Anti-Stress Cocktail'.  Basically it is a pina colada with their own special blend of herbals (yerba buena, mint, basil, anise, etc).  It is served to you virgin and then they plop down a bottle of rum for you to doctor it up yourself. The rum is 'Vitamin R'.

The restaurant overlooks their farm and the presentation garden of veggies and flowers.  Just a stupendously beautiful view out over the valley.  It was an amazing experience.  The family is delightful and you feel like you are at a big family dinner with them.

The gang trying to keep up with all the food.

 

View from our table.

Daughter of the original owner. Sassy one, adorable.

Part of the farm available for tour

View of the restaurant from below.

Typical traffic in the area.

These busses actually take workers to the farms.
(I thought they might be for prisoners at first--whoops)

 After a brief stop in the downtown area of Vinales to walk off lunch, we made one last stop at the Mural de Prehistoria. The mural is a bit of a misnomer since it ISN'T prehistoric, but more of a modern art interpretation of prehistoric life done in the '60s. It's quite....um......colorful?  if you ever want to entertain yourself, read the reviews about it online.  Especially those who expected to see real prehistoric art. 

There is a restaurant/bar/gift shop there also.  Another small bar featured pina coladas for 3 CUC--you add the Havana Club.  Delicious.  Everything is made from fresh pineapple and coconut milk.  I must have offended the bartender on my pour size because he shook his head at me and gave me another shot.  Yep, I'm sleeping on the way home!

The mural.

Pina colada--medicate yourself.

Welcome Party

At the captains' meeting I noticed that they were preparing a big charcoal pit and had a WHOLE HOG on a spit.  Oh baby, is that for us? Bring on the carnage.  Later we check on the pig, James and Jana where giving the rotisserie to spin.  It was for us.  Slow roast pork.  YAY!

Jana also got excited with all of the old Czech cars that Cuba has. So of course....photo op! Our Czech with the Skoda!

 

The welcoming party was good, Commodore Escritch went a little Telemundo on us with his speech and I kept cracking up.  Also, joining us was the vice They had free drinks, heavy appetizers and of course, Mr. Pig.

Chicharrones fresh off the hoof!

Later they had an all girl band and the dancing started, I think some locals were invited to help with the mingling and dancing.  Some just hung outside the yacht club and had their own party.

 

Boat Parade-aka Herding Cats

Sunday was the big boat parade.  This took a lot of work by Commodore Escrich of the Hemingway yacht Club, because you just can't cruise into Havana Harbor. Anybody who has told you they do, and without special permission are either 1-lying or 2-did something VERY illegal.

Tim elected me to attend the captains' briefing on how this was going to pan out. Commodore Escrich conducted the meeting (in Spanish translated) and got very emotional that there would be around 60 American and Cuban boats in the parade.  It was featured on the news and radio and citizens were encouraged to line up on the Malecon to watch the parade.  The Commodore was actually teary eyed and couldn't stress enough the cultural importance of this event to his country.

Of course, what happens when you get 60 sailboat captains together--instant chaos. Nope, they don't want to do it this way or that way or whatever.  I ran mediation a couple of times when things got too spikey.

Countdown to chaos in 5...4...3...2....

Commodore Escrich explaining the parade route.

 

We were given our position assignments in the parade and who was in front of us and who was behind us.  I found my group mates and we gave descriptions of our boats. We were all to monitor Ch 77 on the radio.

We had to do a flyby of the customs dock so that they could see us leaving and confirm our crew. Absolutely no locals can come on board, they can/will be arrested.

First, the organizers had said, all boats leave at once, in which all captains said WHAT?  Can you imagine the clusterf**k that would have been.  Then they said they would call out boat positions and you go to the customs dock then.  That was the plan.

The Commodore's yacht--Follow me, please!

Boats heading out....not necessarily as discussed.....

 

We all got back to our boats, we prepped but hung out since we were at the end of the parade anyway, and listened to the radio chatter. It took approximately 5 minutes for the system to break down with boats clearing customs.  Radio chatter was some of the most amusing stuff I have listened to in a long time.

One of the 'gaggle of Island Packets' as was quoted on the radio.

Queuing up for the customs dock flyby.

  

Heading out of the channel.
Narrow channel with cross current that goes from 0 to really freaking deep in a hurry.

Finally it was our turn (or we decided it was). Tim had helm and I was coms officer, we did our driveby of the customs dock and headed to the first rendezvous spot, at which we were to start with parade position.  The boats got so stretched out that the first boats to the rendezvous got pushed away by the current so they had to head back.

Finally, the parade of boats started, we were supposed to keep 2-3 boat lengths between us and of course our place in line.  Oh, man, the smack talk started then.  The boys on our boat were getting into it and I wound up repeating some things that weren't true.  (thanks you knuckleheads)

Then in the only goofy/disorganized way that sailors can manage, we got the damn parade underway.  

Sorta, kinda, sorta looking like a parade line now.

But not exactly....

The Russian Embassy...Soviet era design, supposed to signify the handle of
a sword sticking into the earth.
Those Russkis.

  

We had to coordinate our entry into Havana Harbor with the beginning parade boats LEAVING Havana Harbor so that we could get our glamour shot in front of El Morro castle.  The Cruising World photographer was on land taking the pictures, one of the Harmony yacht people had the rally flag and was signing to us to slow down/speed up for the photographer.

People lining on up the Malecon.

El Morro Castle.

More folks on the harbor entrance.

Small fishing boats and the tour bus staging area.

We had a great time yelling Hola! and waving to the people on shore, the kids were especially cute, they were jumping about and excited.  I even saw our bus driver from the tour the day before and he gave us a really big wave.

Once we got to the statue of the Christ (to signify blessing of our fleet) we turned and headed out. We passed the Commodore's boat and then we were given the order to fly our sails back to the Marina.  Of course the wind was straight behind us, so once we got past the Malecon (the sea wall promenade of Havana) we doused the main and motor sailed back. (Much to the chagrin of my crew mate who was of course in race mode--sorry charlie, LizzyM ain't a racer, she's a tank)

Sails going up for the return trip home.

 

We got back, did another flyby of customs to show that we still had 4 crew and no locals we got back to our slip. At one point, I thought there was going to be secondary confusion because some boats said they weren't going back to their same slip, luckily they realized that they had to because of the water and electricity charges.

Clean up and get ready for the party!