A Day Trip to the Cueva Del Indio (.Indian Cave), Pinar del Rio, Cuba

Our Day Trip to the Vinales Region, Cuba

There are a lot of things to do at our resort and we could easily stay there all week enjoying the fine weather, private beach and the great food.










This is our first time visiting Cuba; we are excited and want to see a few more places. We purchased an all day excursion to a few famous attractions. Needed to be ready to be picked up at 7:00 am by the tour bus, we missed the sumptuous breakfast that we enjoy so much at this Cuban resort.

The tour bus picked up other fellow passengers at various hotels in Havana.





This process took almost 2 hours.  Finally, by about 9 am, we embarked on the trip to Vinales! 

There are fourteen provinces in Cuba; Vinales is located in the province of Pinar del Rio, which is an impoverish province but the one with the perfect fertile soil for tobacco growing. 

We visited four different places on this excursion. 

1. The first place was a small rum factory where the Cuban drinks are made.

However, today being a Saturday, the workers were off, therefore, we saw empty work stations.

a mini guava

Secretly, I was happy for them! I was glad that unlike many other countries in many parts of the world where workers have to labour six or seven days a week, Cuban workers work six days with a day off each week. Good for them!

Rum is made from these mini fermented guavas

Our tour guide showed us a bowl of mini guava from which the rum was made and we were each served a small sample of the rum.

A machine for rum making and bottling

For some unknown reasons, it seemed that all the tour buses arrived at this rum factory at the same time. There was a huge lineup at the small shop staffed by only one cashier selling the rums made here.


We managed to buy two bottles at 3.95 peso each. A good price for a Cuban gift for friends back in Canada.

2. Indian Cave - After we left the rum factory, we travelled towards Pina del Rio to visit the Indian Cave.

The Vinales region is known for the mogotes, dome shape mountains rising out of flat plain

We passed by beautiful limestone mountains with holes of various shapes on them.

When we got to the parking lot of our destination, there were a few tour buses arriving at the same time.

There was a huge lineup going into the cave.


















Our tour guide suggested us to have lunch first before visiting the cave, which we did.


We befriended a few American tourists at our lunch table and had a great chat with them about their positive travel experience in Cuba and in various places,

At least three of them concurred that the next good place to visit would be St. Matin in the Caribbean islands.
We made a note of that and would definitely keep this in mind for our next travel destination.

After a home style meal of roast chicken, potatoes, rice, fresh fruits and rice pudding and coffee, we were ready for the tour of the Cueva Del Indio.

There was still a lineup going in to the cave.

Some tourists posed for pictures with a couple of aboriginal people




























This was the cave where the native Indians went into hiding from the Spaniards, therefore is called Indian Cave in Spanish.

This limestone cave is full of  formations of various shapes with various passage ways.

We waited for at least forty minutes in the cave for the boat ride through the cave.




















People were not happy about the wait.

Fortunately, everyone was very polite; there was no grumbling, pushing or showing of cave rage by anyone.




There was a group of English speaking young people in front of us, (not sure which country they were from), but they were a bit loud but were very well behaved!

They were enjoying themselves, playing some dance music, posing for pictures, laughing and joking around.

Watching how happy these young people were made me feel happy and alive too! Thanks to their contagious laughter and good behaviour!

After waiting for more than forty minutes, finally it was our turn for the boat ride on the river that runs through the cave.  The tour boat was a small one that could accommodate fourteen people at a time.

A boat ride inside the Cueva Del Indio (the Indian Cave),  Pinar del Rio, Cuba

The Indian Cave is carved out of a limestone hill.

 As our boat travelled along the river, the guide used a laser pointer pointing out the various rock formations resembling animals such as a fish, a crocodile and others.

But the boat went too fast and I was unable to catch all the shapes mentioned to us.

The boat ride was about ten minutes, but the scenery was well worth it!














R.T.
Indian Cave
Vinales Region
Cuba
Week of Jan.9, 2017