Cuba
Traveller Testimonial
[This tour] offered the broadest exposure to Cuba of tours we considered. The highlights
were meeting the Cuban people--farmers, sugarcane workers, teachers, factory workers--hiking
in the Escambray Mountains, visiting a tobacco famer's house, boating through the Indian Cave
in Vinales, pedi-cabbing around Camaguey and New Year in Santiago de Cuba.
The largest island in the Caribbean and the sixteenth largest
island in the world, Cuba, is the last bastion of socialism in the
western hemisphere. A former Spanish colony that achieved its
independence following the Spanish defeat by America at the turn of
the twentieth century, Cuba turned to a communist ideology in the
1960s under Fidel Castro and his top lieutenant Che Guevara, an act
which evoked the concern and incurred the wrath of the United
States—the latter coming in the form of sanctions.
Only recently has Cuba managed to break free from the shackles
imposed by the negative associations of communism and in the 1990s,
the country saw its forty-year isolation end with an influx of
Western tourism. Indeed, it is Cuba’s long isolationism that proves
one of the main attractions for travellers, as destinations
untouched by Western influence are now so few and far between, and
this, combined with the friendliness of its unique people and sights
of natural beauty, guarantees Cuba ever more popularity in the
future.
Endowed with some of the most paradisiacal white-sand beaches and
turquoise-blue, warm waters around its over-3,500 kilometre
coastline, Cuba is the ultimate beach-enthusiast destination. Where
sun-worshippers can recline under a gently swaying palm tree on one
of the 300 or so beaches littered across the island, others may find
contentment snorkelling or diving amid the iridescent coral reefs
that teem with marine life. Inland Cuba boasts plunging valleys,
glorious mountains, thick forests, cascading waterfalls and
colourful wildlife, all of which make a feast for the eyes and lend
themselves as an idyllic setting for hiking, mountain biking and
exploration.
As noteworthy as Cuba’s natural bounties may be, travellers need to
explore the cities, like the capital, Havana, to appreciate fully
the unique charms of the country. With their colonial architecture,
plethora of 1950s-esque American cars and imposing Revolutionary
monuments, Cuban cities are strikingly unusual in history, colour
and character and quite welcomingly resemble nowhere else on the
globe. These street scenes are only enhanced by the laid-back
lifestyle and friendly disposition of the Cuban people—a population
of largely Spanish and African descent—with the result that Cuba is
an up-and-coming destination to be visited sooner rather than later.