The process of making our way to Havana started a while before the actual trip. With US law making it a bit of a runaround to get down to this beautiful country, we booked our tickets through an agency in Canada for our tourist Visa and our Cancun to Havana flights. Tickets booked and only a small amount of travel research done, we board flights out of Denver to Cancun where we meet up and travel down to Akumal, Mexico with our friend Erica for a nice afternoon on turtle beach followed by some homemade Mexican food. I must admit, that I was feeling pretty excited to make the trip to Cuba, and I’m not convinced I slept a whole lot. The quick drive back up to Cancun had us glad we did’t stay in the City, and excited to move on.
Erica and Elisabeth enjoy a dip in the Cenote off of Turtle Beach in Mexico.
As we board the Air Cuba flight, its clear from the beginning that they are not as upgraded as most Western aircraft. The flight is short and as we land in Havana, the rain is pouring. Even compared to the coast of Mexico, the humidity is incredible, as we enter the airport we are immediately time warped back in time. Our first greeting to Cuban culture is one of lines, really long lines. Inclement weather seemed to push all flights to a similar arrival time and the antiquated system for processing immigration at the airport could not handle the load. For easily 2 hours we inched forward in the non air-conditioned room and the only thing that seemed to spark any excitement was a frustrated french man who desperately tried to cut in line to escape the madness, he was quickly ushered back to his spot by a heckling from the crowd and a calm gesture from the officer. Finally approaching the counter we were asked about everywhere we could have possibly traveled that might have had Ebola. Beyond that, the process was simple and uneventful. Finally out of the airport we found ourselves standing watching it rain harder than it ever does at home.
2200 miles later we are finally waiting in line in Havana.
We brought Euros to exchange because they gave a better and less penalized rate than the Dollar. The airport exchange rates are rather poor, so we only exchanged enough to get through the night. Our taxi drive brought us to the Old Havana part of town where we began a difficult search for a “Casa Particular;” it would be difficult to say the least with the streets all but deserted and the rain continuing to pour. Immediately we began to see the hospitality of the Cuban people. Our taxi driver walks over to a nearby restaurant that is shutting down for the evening and talks to one of the waiters who offers up his home for the night for around $10. While not an official Casa Particular, it gets us out of a pinch and in the morning we venture out in search of another place to stay and to explore the city a bit.
The building we spent our first night in Cuba in.