San Juan Santiago de Cuba

... and stumbled to our casa quite late. A few  days later we bumped into one of the students at the bus terminal.  He wanted to give us a reggaton CD that he and his friends recorded at a studio.  He waited for more than an hour for his friend to bring the cd to us and he insisted we took extra fruit for our bus journey.  It is these types of incidents which there were several that you really feel the warmth of ...

... de top. Vanaf hier moet er nog een trap van 459 treden worden beklommen maar dat mag, ondanks de hitte, de pret niet drukken. Op de top hebben we inderdaad een prachtig uitzicht ondanks het feit dat het niet helemaal helder is. We ruiken en zien Jamaica dan ook jammer genoeg niet. De terugweg verloopt een stuk soepeler ondanks het feit dat de remmen oververhit kunnen raken en de remmen daardoor niet meer werken ...

Le pire trajet en bus de ma vie: 9h et malade comme un chien... un mec monte je ne sais plus dans quelle ville et s´assoit à côté de moi, peux pas lui parler, enfin si je lui parle mais pas très bien! il s´appelle Christian. 2 jours à Santiago ou j´ai un peu planée mais bien quand même. je recroise Christian dans la rue. Départ pour Baracoa à 7h lundi 18 matin, je recroise Christian à la oficina Viazul, décidemment Viazul...!!!

... of many pilgrims seeking the healing powers of the Black Virgin El Morro, a castle/fort used to used to protect the city from coastal invasions. The taxi is a 1959 something or other with red leather seats and surprisingly in good shape for its age, though I wonder how it doesn't fall apart as we drop into many many potholes en route. Needing food we ask the driver to recommend a café, he knows of a place, but when we get there we find they have nothing that's on the menu ...

... rain hits just as we arrive and with flashes of very close lightening and the immediate rumbles of thunder, the dark and antique décor of their home takes on the feeling of a haunted house a la Scooby Doo. The conversation flows again, get deep into our history and hurts and it's sad to say goodbye as we part at the end of the night. I arrive back at the Casa having wandered through the damp semi-lit streets only to find no electricity in my Casa. I fumble my way through ...

... Also on the flight, I got talking to some cool black Cuban guy who was an int**national Badminton umpire. Unfortunately Hector kept saying to Ben "don't trust the ******s" - what, the guy who was a laugh, and int**esting?? Hector was a ****! Once we landed safely (just about), me and Ben made our excuses and jumped in some random black dude's car and got a lift to our hotel. The guy was pretty sound, 21, and whacked up the ...

... to hear beer bottles opening on a bus. Anyway, later on, this same bus driver picked up his girlfriend/wife, but she was unhappy about something, and they proceeded to have a domestic in the seats behind us. Truly lovely. The washrooms also went downhill pretty rapidly. At one stop, there was neither running water nor toilet paper (let alone soap!) and when I approached one of the sinks to see if it was working, cockroaches scurried out from ...

... on high alert!) but they unfortunately got fined and taken off to the police station for doing that - the government uses strong-arm tactics to discourage "fraternization" between foreigners and locals. It's supposed to be aimed at stopping tourists from being harassed by dodgy locals (although it didn't work for me in Havana!) but I think it's more just to stop communication - all those dangerously anti-communist or pro-democratic things we might talk ...

... dance and a drink, was a really, really good night. Saw Santiago Zoo, where a 'guide' (just some guy who was wandering round) latched on to me and showed me round which was helpful as nothing was signposted. he knew all the animals names and how old they were. My spanish isnt brilliant but i'm pretty sure he said he'd been wandering the zoo 'helping' tourists for thirty two years. They ahve lions, tigers, hyenas, a rhino, python, monkeys ...

... of the mansion. In the dining room there was a huge buffet set up for us with all sorts of dishes and desserts. We even had a string quartet play for us while we ate. We felt like royalty. By Cuban standards, North Americans and Europeans are very wealthy and we were definitely treated that way. It was enjoyable for a moment, but then I realized that literally down the street from us people were starving. The lunch was nice, but I didn't feel like a was worthy of such treatment. Just ...