Viñales

Hello World,
Sorry for the long delay in updating this, Cuba has been keeping me busy! There is so much to see and do that I’m thinking that four months might not be enough!
Let’s start from last weekend. Get settled, this one is going to be long.
Katie, Kyra, Susan and I set out early Friday morning for Viñales, a UNESCO protected system of mountains and caves about three and a half hours west of Havana in the Pinar del Rio province. We took a tour bus from outer Havana through the beautiful, rural countryside along the highway. There were many tobacco and banana farms (called fincas), oxen drawn plows, and humble thatched homes with colorful clothing hanging to dry outside. About half way, we turned into the mountains for a short stop at Las Terrazas, a terraced eco-friendly farming community in a paradise of palm trees, mountains and teal watered lakes. It was absolutely gorgeous! They have a fully self-sustainable community with schools, housing, shops, and a medical clinic, as well as tourist attractions like a zip line, paddle boats and camping spots. Definitely a place that is on my list of placed to return. We headed back down the mountain toward Viñales, alongside more mountains and farms for about an hour, then through the city of Pinar del Rio, and finally into our destination.
When we stepped off of the bus, we were swarmed by village women with business cards offering us rooms in their homes to say in for the weekend. We found an offer that we liked and followed her through the small, one main road town, to her family’s home. Unfortunately, we had some troubles with identification and they wouldn’t accept that we were temporary Cuban residents and we had to find another place to stay. We found a lovely family down the street that accepted our ID and rented us two rooms for the weekend at 15 CUC (same in dollars) per night, plus the option of dinner for 7 CUC and breakfast for 3 CUC. The family was made up of the owner-Margarita, her husband-Estevan, Margarita’s mother, father, sister, and 1-year old nephew, as well as Estevan’s son from a previous marriage that comes home on weekends. They welcomed us with freshly pureed banana juice, oriented us to the neighborhood, and set us up with guides to explore the mountains and tips for where to visit. We headed out into town after that, with an imposing chain of round-topped, tree covered mountains in front of us. The four of us ended up wandering down a dirt path into a tobacco farm, where farmers were harvesting their leaves and tending to a calf that had been born a few days before. Then we headed down to the other end of town to find the botanical gardens, which came highly recommended, but no one in the town knew about. After getting directions from two school children, an oxen cart driver and a lady at a bus stop (also being the klutz that I am and running straight into a bench and bruising my leg pretty badly), we found the gardens behind a gate covered in halved grapefruit and oranges and bananas on a string. Oh…and there was also the doll head fence toppers and baby doll scarecrows, both would have scared off any bird or intruder…it was crazy. The gardens ended up being very nice, some beautiful flowers and views of the Mongote mountains, and a plate of fresh fruit at the end of the path. We headed back to the house for sunset, where we sat on the flat roof and got to see “el puesto del sol” with a full view of the mountain range and the oranges and bright yellows of the sunset. That was definitely a memorable experience and made for some great pictures. We headed down to the best Cuban dinner so far, of fried fish, tomato and bean soup, rice, plantain chips, tomatoes, cabbage, pineapple, grapefruit, papaya, bread, and mojitos. It was sooo good and the four of us polished it off. After that, we planned out the rest of the weekend, tried to motivate ourselves to go out, but with a lack of an idea of where to go and being exhausted, we crashed.
The next day, we were greeted by freshly harvested and ground coffee, eggs, bread and guava jelly, pineapple juice, pineapple and grapefruit for breakfast. We then had the chance to learned how to make the coffee from Margarita’s mom, Clara, who was about 75 and had an electric personality that became made us excited about whatever she was doing or talking about. So she showed us how to roast the beans, how to know when they’re done, then the proper way to let them cool, how to grind them by hand and the way to brew the coffee in a cast iron pot. All of it was interesting and I bought a pound of the final product to let you all sample! After that, we grabbed some peso snacks and were picked up by our guide, who led us to his house and saddled each of us on a horse. Of course, I got the little one, named Luciero. We headed into the valley between the line of mountains that are visible from the village and the strip parallel to them, where the caves are located. We road through tobacco, sugar cane, corn, coffee and banana fincas, each one a bit different from the next and got to see some amazing views of the mountain range. After riding for a bit, and occasionally racing each other, we visited a campesino, or combination farmer/rancher/cowboy, who invited us into his home and showed us his land. We began by processing raw sugar cane through a machine called a trapiche, similar to a rotating press, which extracted sugar juice from the cane. The guides and four of us each got a cup, then were given a splash of rum and grapefruit juice to make the drink one of the best I have ever had. After that, we got to try a hand harvested and made cigar, of tobacco and guava leaves, honey, rum and sugar. The combination was really good and I picked some up for you guys at home. After trying out the trapiche and machete to process the sugar cane and hearing about the crops, we headed into the mountains toward the caves. We road through a tobacco field and saw the drying process, over a wooden bridge, and arrived at the cave. We left the horses outside and headed into the pitch dark with lanterns, wandering through stalactites and stalagmites and hearing the ecological history of the cave system. We reached the end of the cave and were guided to a swimmable lake! We had our bathing suits on, so we jumped in and explored the cave that way! It was chilly, but refreshing since it was about 90 out on the horses. The water was over my head for most of the way, but toward the end, it became shallower and the lake ended in a mud pit! Supposedly the mud has healing powers, which may or may not be true, but it made for a great mud fight regardless. We swam back and headed out of the cave for our ride back with the horses. The way back was more a chance to see the incredible views of the mountains and ride fast on the horses than visit the sites, so it was a different way to see the same path that we had taken into the valley. The tour ended and we headed back to our casa particular for showers (hot water!!!! The first since I’ve been here!) and the food that we had brought to make our own dinner. We headed out to a salsa and reggaeton party on the town central square, but that ended pretty quickly when one of my friends started feeling sick and it didn’t seem to be a quick fix. We headed back to the casa with her and Margarita’s family was great in helping us take care of her, calling a doctor and everything to make sure that she would be ok. She started feeling a bit better around midnight and fell asleep, so we all got some rest and waited it out until the morning.
I had breakfast early in the am, of bread and honey, coffee, pineapple juice and eggs, then we all packed up before our bus and headed out for one last walk around the town to get everyone some fresh air and recoup from the night before. We ended up walking down a random dirt path again, on the opposite end of town than before, and found a campesino and his family walking just a head of us. I asked him where a coffee finca was and he guided us there, showed us around each crop, explained their growing season and profit (**side note**-1 seasonal harvest of tobacco for about an acre of land is only paid 10.50 CUC by the state, so that is either all the family can live on for a year, or they have to expand their property or diversify crops, yet each cigar made from that tobacco costs 10 CUC and only requires ½ of the leaves from one plant) After our tour of the crops, he showed us a day old baby goat, which was adorable, showed us his drying house for tobacco leaves and rolled us each a cigar from his plants. It was such an unexpected morning, but turned out to be my favorite part of the trip. We paid him 60 pesos for his help and the look on his face was unforgettable, just absolutely ecstatic and thankful. It was all we had, the equivalent of $3, but he was so happy…it was an incredible moment. We headed back to our house and said our goodbyes, exchanging contact info to keep in touch, then went to the bus station for our 2 o’clock bus back to Havana. I passed for 11 for the kids fare (yea yea yea, but hey! It was ½ price!) and we wound our way back through the Cuban countryside back to Havana just in time for dinner!
The end of my Viñales story. Look up at the next blog for more stories from the week. New pictures are being posted!