Museo de la Revolucion, Old Havana, Cuba

On Sunday, we had originally planned to attend a Sunday Service in Cuba. 

Unfortunately, we were told that there was no church close by to our hotel. The Sunday service closest to us would be the one in Old Havana which started at 10:30am.  

Museo de la Revolucion, Havana, Cuba

The hotel shuttle bus would not take us there in time.

 So we changed our plan. We stayed in the resort for the morning, relaxed and enjoyed the beach. I joined in the dance lesson again!. 

After lunch, we hailed a taxi to Havana. From our resort to Old Havana was about about a 20 minute ride and we negotiated a fare of 15 pesos  (with a 2 pesos tip, it came up to around Canadian $25.00) with the cab driver who took us to the Museo de la Revolution in the afternoon.

Front entrance of the Museum of Revolution, Havana, Cuba

The Museum is a three story building that used to be the home of Cuban Presidents prior to the revolution. 

The admission charge to the museum was eight Cuban pesos each  person for non Cuban. For Cuban nationals, the charge was much cheaper.

The splendid interior of the Museo de la Revolucion 

Beautiful domes inside the Museum of Revolution, Havana, Cuba

The symbolism is significant here when we learned about the Cuban history and its people, and how a former palace for its president prior the revolution has been turned into a Revolution Museum.

Looking from the top of the former palace into its courtyard

As we walked up the grand staircases, we could sense the opulence of this former grand palace.

It is a magnificent building with marvelous architecture!

Bullet holes on the  former palace walls are vivid reminders of the revolution

We saw many bullet holes on the walls in this grand building.

These holes on the wall were made during the attack to the Presidential Palace on March 13, 1957. 

Fidel and his revolutionary forces' journey are documented  here

The attack was carried out by Members of the Revolutionary Directory, armed organization of the University Students Federation.

"The History Will Absolve Me" document in both Spanish & English

Currently, it houses exhibits of documents, clothing and various things related to the Cuban Revolution.

Fidel's statue stands proudly in the main floor of the building

With much sacrifices from the Cuban people such as Jose Marti, Fidel Castro along with his brother Raul and Ernesto Che Guevara led and won the Revolution in 1959.  

Sculpture of Che and other revolutionary hero

The exhibits are mainly old photos, letters, statues and relics that chronicled the struggles of the revolutionary forces leading up to their triumph.


















Off course, the museum also takes note of outside influences from other country such as the U.S. presidents and its policies of isolation towards Cuba.

The influences of the U.S. presidents and their administrations were not forgotten in this Cuban museum.

We learned a lot about the Cuban revolution and  the courage/ sacrifices of the Cuban people.



R.T.
The Revolution Museum
Old Havana
Cuba

Mural de la Prehistoria, a Wall Mural on a Cuban Mountain

The Valle de Vinales region is dotted with mogotes

After the tobacco farm visit, the tour bus took us to see a mural painted on a side of a mountain in Valle de Vinales.

Valle de Vinales is known for its beautiful karst landscape dotted with mogotes - a series of doom shape mountains as high as 300 meters rising abruptly out of flat plains.

Mogotes are series of dome shaped mountains rising out of flat plains

Since this region was declared as an UNESCO site in 1999, tourists have been flocking to the area.

The inhabitants in this area is around seven thousand people. However, each day, there are around three thousand tourists coming to visit this region!

There used to be seven restaurants here a few years ago. Currently this number has increased to seventy.

The Vinales Valley has the perfect soil for growing tobacco 

The tobacco farm located in the Vinales Valley is a region with fertile soil perfect for the growing of tobacco









During the early 1959, Dr. Jimenez told Fidel Castro about his visits to these mountains and how he had found fossils of fish, skulls of saurians and evidence of aboriginal settlements in these caves.

Valle de Vinales is known for its beautiful mogotes. 

This talk led to the idea of painting a wall mural on this mogote. Hence, the Mural de la Prehistoria was born.



They cleaned the mountain and painting began in 1960. It lasted for four years.















This mural represents the life of the first inhabitants of the Cuban archipelago.







The Mural de la Prehistoria measures 80 meters in height and 120 meters in length and it is one of the largest wall murals in the world.

Mural de la Prehistoria, Pinar del Rio, Cuba

This region has been declared as a UNESCO heritage site

It depicts the evolution from the primitive trilobite to dinosaurs and to human beings.

Afterwards, we arrived at a scenic
lookout point where we took photos of the impressive mountain range,

We saw a beautiful resort hotel there and I bought a Cuban hat at one of the outside stalls.

It was a full day for us and we saw a lot! Our tour bus made its way back to Havana and the traffic was congested!

 I am sure the traffic has increased a lot recently due to the rise in the number of tourists visiting Cuba. We were the last two tourists being dropped off and we arrived at our resort at 5 minutes before 9 pm, just in time to make it for our dinner!

A great excursion indeed!

R.T.

Having a fantastic time!
Valle de Vinales
Cuba
Week of Jan. 9, 2017

A Visit to a Tobacco Farm, Pinar del Rio, Cuba

On our way to visit a tobacco farm in Pinar del Rio

On our excursion to the Pinar del Rio region, we visited other places as well.

A Visit to a Tobacco Farm - After our visit to the Indian Cave, we continued our tour of the province of Pinar del Rio.

We visited a tobacco farm in the Pinar del Rio region, Cuba

We arrived at a local tobacco farm.

This tobacco farmer has about 15 hectares of land.


The tobacco farm is located in the Vinales Valley which is a region with fertile soil perfect for the growing of tobacco plants.

A farmer drying the tobacco leaves on the sun

.

This farm is largely devoted to the growing of tobacco. Area farmers still use the traditional method for tobacco cultivation which has survived for several centuries as machines lower the quality of the tobacco.

We saw one of the farmers harvesting tobacco leaves by hands.

After the harvesting of the tobacco leaves, farmers hang them to dry in the sun for the drying process.

A tobacco plant

This was the first time we saw tobacco plants and leaves!

A Cuban tobacco farmer received us on his farm

The tobacco farmer received us in his farm house and gave us a demonstration.

He described to us in a very lively presentation the process of drying and fermenting the leaves.  

 The tobacco seeds are fine and tiny

He started by showing us how tiny those tobacco seeds are.

The tobacco leaves being dried and fermented indoors

After the tobacco leaves are dried, the colour turn from green to brown.

During the drying process, the leaves have to be hung carefully as they cannot be overlapping each other.

We were graciously received by a local tobacco farmer

We learned that the Cuban government keeps 90% of the harvest of the tobacco crop, and each farmer in Cuba gets to keep 10% for himself only.

Rolling a cigar with three dried tobacco leaves

The farmer demonstrated how to roll a Cuban cigar from three tobacco leaves. Using a knife and simple tools carried on his belt, he expertly rolled a cigar.

A visitor smoking a locally produced Cuban cigar

 Our host demonstrated for one of the visitors how to smoke a cigar. 

We were treated to a local rum at the farmer's house

After the cigar demonstration, we were all treated to another sample of the rum produced in this region in this farmer's house.

Living Room of a tobacco's farmer's house

Many of us wanted to purchase some cigars produced on this farm. Unfortunately, they were all bought up by the visitors from the previous tour buses.

A kitchen in a  Cuban tobacco farmer's house 

Allowed to keep 10% of his crop, a tobacco farmer in Cuba has a very limited amount for himself or for selling to others.

A little courtyard at the tobacco farmer's house

It was an educational and fun experience visiting a tobacco farm and learning about the production process of the famous Cuban cigars!



R.T.
On a Tobacco Farm
Valle de Vinales
Pinar del Rio
Cuba

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