Horizontes Rancho San Vicente Vinales

... 4 Tage abgeschnitten von der Aussenwelt in der Hoehle auf Hilfe warten etc. Nix fuer uns, wir sind auch mit dieser tollen Tour voll zufrieden. Schaut mal auf die Fotos, sie geben vielleicht einen kleinen Eindruck von den Felsformationen.

Nach ein paar Tagen wird es fuer uns Zeit, weiterzuziehen, denn es gibt ja auf dieser Insel noch mehr zu entdecken. Ohne Mietwagen ist dabei der Bustransport das groesste Problem, denn es gibt zwar inzwischen ...

... though Armando could not speak a word of English he was pretty good explaining the crops and various plants they use for infusions to cure their diarrhoea or urinary problems. Don't ask me how he got those messages across but he did LOL. The cave he brought me into was fantastic. Not your typical tourist promenade. We let our eyes adjust to the dark for a bit then proceeded through walking on the very uneven natural formations and at times along a wall ...

... to Vinales really wasn't what we had in mind but at least it gave us an extra day.

Papo and Magalys welcomes us into their home, though it didn't take Papo long to start selling us guided trips in and around Vinales. We agreed to a horse ride with one of his friends around the Magoes for te next day and thought we'd do a guided tour with Papo the day after.

Magalys served us a really nice chicken soupe for dinner and then we were finally left in peace ...

... and the locals, I still feel that I´m searching for my little groove. This is our last night with our familie(s), we bought a bottle of rum and vodka for them that 3 of us devoured ovr a few games of billiards, in which the rum was uncannilly helping me this time, as I nearly remained flawless. After we went to the town square that got transformed into la fiesta at night, before retiring to bed. the 13th came, and I awake to the roosters without ...

... road just after the cave was completely flooded, a guy was waiting there with his bike and his monkey. Obviously his chained monkey was there as a paying attraction for tourists; so I did ostensibly took out my camera but never once pointed it to the monkey. Well actually I did, but not while the guy could see it. That showing him that I was not a potential client for taking pics of his animal earned me a nice discussion, tranquilo, without pressure. Later a bus crossed the flooded ...

... I started to point them out. The man waved dismissively, telling me that he wouldn’t be looking at the car anywhere near that closely on its return. I wasn’t quite so sure, but to give him his dues we most definitely succeeded in adding a couple of extra dents to the car’s undercarriage on the country’s absolutely terrible roads and my credit card remained charge-free.

Derek and I had opted to share the driving, but ...

... s symptoms and are getting the kids ready for bed when Julie realizes she recognizes the early signs of mastitis. She pops the first double dose of Zithromax we've brought along, and not a second to lose. Over the next few hours, she goes through fever, chills, vomiting. It's alarming how fast it sets up. Finally at 3 a.m., she's sleeping. This leaves me with an hour to rest before the roosters wake up (a late start for them), at which point I discover that all the ...

... felt compelled to include people in my photos (the idea of Cuba without its people is bizarre), but they're still there in many, even at this hour, driving oxen through paprika-coloured earth, riding horses across fields, putting the reluctant green of the tobacco plants out to dry. We finally leave these ox tracks and lanes at the bizarrely psychedelic Mural de la Prehistoria, created in the 60s. Someone in the ...

... a 120m-long mural painted on a mountainside. The huge snails, dinosaurs, sea monsters and humans took five years to complete and symbolise the theory of evolution. It is monumentally, psychedelically, horrendous. We toured the beautiful Cueva del Indio, marveling at the cathedral-like limestone pillars and chandeliers. We glided under limestone draperies towards the underground waterfall - once in the boat there was a power cut. We ate, for the first time, at the casa. We ...

... and it did. I got the *****. I knew I shouldn't have eaten the salad with dinner. At 2pm Lee and Paul (my english mates from the bus ride) dragged me out to get a pizza, which was little supplement for the who knows how many litres I'd shat out and thrown up that morning. I forced myself to cycle 6km out to the Mural de la Prehistoria, which was interesting, but this really took it out of me. As soon as I got back to my casa I crashed.