Chris's blog

Tijs and Mel's wedding

Three months after my last endurance trip back to NZ, it was time to return again - to be best man for Tijs and Melissa's wedding. As I saw it, being a best man involved three main things:

1. Getting Tijs mothered on his buck's night

2. Not doing anything gormless during the ceremony

3. Deliving a good speech to the reception

As far as the buck's night went, 3 nights of no sleep thanks to jet lag had encouraged the creation of a range of challenges designed to mostly mess Tijs up - by the time Clint joined us at 8.30pm, he was sure that we would get booted out of the restaurant we were in by that stage.

The buck's night started off with some paintball - unknown to me was the tradition my friends had developed to make the groom and best man "run the guantlet" - which involved getting shot at point blank range by 10 guys with paintball guns. Neither Tijs nor I were in great shape after this!

We then got cleaned up and headed out on the town in Wellington. Tijs of course lost all his "challenges", resulting in him being handcuffed to an inflatable sheep wearing a t-shirt picturing himself naked in the foetal position and being required to drink copious amounts of cooking wine (which we found out the next day was "not for sale as a beverage"!).

 

Tijs and I wear some rice wine

In terms of the "not doing anything gormless during the ceremony", this was a little harder, as it was a Greek Orthodox affair, and Tijs didn't really seem to know what the running order was. As a result, it was a little difficult to know how many times they were going around the alter, and as a result, tripping over my own feet was always a possibility. Although it didn't eventuate, I was also a little confused about when to go witness them signing the deed. However, some frantic gesturing from the priest enabled me to guess when to cross the stage.

In terms of the speech during the reception, I felt pretty comfortable with this, given the amount of presenting I had been doing at work. I mostly spoke off the cuff about Tijs's high school and University antics. Clint wetting himself in the back row also did a lot to encourage me which was useful. I kept it short and to the point as there had been quite a few long speeches after me and I avoided using the mic as I still don't think these are necessary very often unless you have a quiet voice or are speaking at Wembly.

The night after the wedding it was time to fly back to the UK. Turns out flying for 24 hours with a solid hangover is a lot better than you might expect - certainly was easy to sleep even though the dozy Air NZ check in girl put Korina and I in the middle of a block of people (even though we asked for an aisle).

Trip to Cuba - back to Havana

Having finally secured a hotel for the night, I checked out my sunburn - I felt quite perculiar - but it turned out to be more over-heating than really bad sunburn. So after a bit of moaning, once I cooled down I felt much better.

So we headed out to check out Verdado, a part of Havana we had not visited in the first couple of days. We had a look inside the highly ostentatious Hotel Nacional before having a drink at the very kitch (and retro) Havana Libre. Apparently Castro had used the 24th floor of the Havana Libre as his personal office in the months following the revolution. It must have been a strange sight, seeing a whole army of revolutionaries commandeering a flash hotel!

 

 

Nacional hotel

It was then time to find a bite to eat. Korina wanted to go to a Palador before we left Cuba - a Palador is a privately run restaurant. There are not that many of them as most of the restaurants are run by the Government. We managed to find one nearby, which was recommended by the Lonely Planet for its pig on a spit.

We cruised over and ordered two of the "specials", but were a little surprised when the waiter asked us if we wanted anything else - particularly given the perplexed look that he gave us when we said we were fine.

The food came out quickly, and after we had eaten it, we noticed that the other tables were almost exclusively made up of old Western men and their young Cuban "partners". After a few of these couples started playing tonsil hockey, suddenly we realised what the waiter was referring to when he asked if we wanted anything else. I also wondered if the Lonely Planet's recommendation of the pig on a spit was something of a euphemism.

To spell it out a little more clearly, we had apparently just had dinner at a whore house.

Amused, and certainly a little disturbed, we continued off into the night.

The next day the weather had packed it in. We dropped the car off and walked along the Malecon, watching the gigantic waves break over the sea wall and the road.

 

Wave breaking over the Malecon

We also walked past the office of the US special interests in Cuba. As there was an election on, the local cops frowned upon us taking pictures of the propaganda comparing George Bush to Hitler, but we still managed to take a picture of the 73 flags erected immediately outside the office in protest to a US resident who was accused of blowing up an Air Cubana plane in Venuzela. The Americans apparently refused to send the accused person to Venuzela for trial - hence the flags protesting each person who had died in the explosion.

 

73 flags marking Cuban deaths

We then had just enough time to go for an ice cream at the gigantic, crazy, kitsch and very crowded central ice cream plaza, a final peso pizza and it was time to head to the airport. A final mohito capped off the end of a memorable holiday.

 

Farewell mohito

 

Trip to Cuba - Topes de Collante

After a night in Trinidad, we knew it was time to head back to Havana. The last few days had been quite a whirlwind, but we felt that we had seen a lot in a short period of time.

We decided to try and go the back way back to Havana through the mountains and past the waterfalls at Topes de Collante. The first stage was climbing the hill out of Trinidad to the Mirador - it was very steep, and for some unknown reason every corner of the road felt a little like a mogul field. We got up there no problems though, and probably considerably more comfortably than the Aussie fella we saw at the top who had ridden a scooter that he had hired up there!

From the top there were excellent views over Trinidad and to the coast.

 

Hills behind Trinidad

From the Mirador we continued up into the hills, before long arriving at Topes de Collante.

We knew that the hike down to the waterfalls would make us pretty late back into Havana that night, but decided that it was well worth taking a break from driving and getting out in the Cuban countryside one last time before the end of our holiday.

It was a very steep climb down to the waterfalls, and even though it was primarily downhill on the way there, the 29-30 degree heat was enough to make you pretty hot. We had seen quite a few people climbing back up, but luckily when we arrived there was only one person there, and they were just leaving - it was a Cuban guy who was quick to point out that although the water was too cold for him, it would be just fine for us, given that we were clearly from a cold country.

 

Me swimming in Topes de Collante

In any case, he was right - the water was freezing, but it was good to cool off after the walk down. We spent about 20 mins swimming about before it was time to head back up to the car.

Topes de Collantes

Korina in the Topes de Collantes

Map to the Topes de Collantes

Arriving back up the top, and the same Cuban fella was pretty interested to see how quick we had made it back up the hill. We had taken a very respectable 35 mins to get back up, but he was quick to point out that whilst this was a good time, he himself had scrambled back up in 30 mins.

From Topes de Collantes it was a nightmare to find the right road to get back onto the motorway - again, no signs meant we ended up asking for directions at every intersection. Additionally, the roads through the mountains were some of the most potholed we came across in the whole of Cuba. At one stage I thought we must have come close to breaking an axle. 30km of crawling along at around 20km/h, swerving violently to miss potholes, and we were back at the motorway.

It was right in the heat of the day, and around then I noticed that I had managed to get sunburnt whilst we were hiking - pretty disappointing given that it was the last day. In any case we had about 200km of motorway driving ahead of us to get back to Havana.

The drive back passed pretty uneventfully, other than me starting to feel pretty unwell again - this time from the heat of driving all day.

We got to Havana under the cover of darkness when the motorway did what roads tend to do in Cuba and evaporated. Before we knew it we were driving down some crazy residential street in the middle of nowhere. We tried to follow a tourist bus, but unfortunately it was heading back to the depo, and by this stage we were getting more and more disoriented. Eventually we saw a taxi with its light on and I asked whether they could give us directions back to the Malecon.

The driver tried a little, but then basically said "screw it, just follow me" - so we followed him all the way back to where we needed to be. Another example of Cuban people looking after you and going a step further than they needed to!

So somewhat luckily we ended up back in Havana where we needed to be. It proved to be quite difficult to get accomodation at that late stage, but after visiting a few hotels and Casas we found a hotel with a room available. It was pretty crappy, but at that stage I was so tired from driving all day that I didn't really care!

Trip to Cuba - Trinidad

 

A day in Playa Luna and I was feeling much stronger. I was also going around the twist, so it was time to leave.

We drove along the coast to Trinidad, an easy hour or so away. Trinidad was the only place where we struggled slightly to get a casa. This was strange, as there are 300 of them there. However, we still had to go around a good 10-20 or so before we found one that was open and had a room available.

The casa that we got was a little like staying in a muesum from the 1930's. All of the furniture was from this period - the casa was owned by an old couple who still had their children (and even grandchildren) staying with them. Apparently the casa had originally been the woman's mother's family's place.

So we dropped off the car and went to have a look around the old part of Trinidad. Trinidad was known for its Jinteros, but we didn't find it to be too bad - maybe we had perfected the use of the phrase "por favor, no mi moleste" - please, don't bother me.

 

Trinidad through the porthole

 

Korina in the porthole

Tower in Trinidad

Trinidad central plaza

We then ascended the hill behind Trinidad where my "sunsets" phase was able to continue...I struggled quite a lot whilst walking up the hill - it was quite clear that I was still not 100%

Random ruin at sunset

Trinidad at sunset

We then headed back down the hill and grabbed dinner at the casa. We had noticed at bit of a street party going on outside, so we talked to one of the sons in the family who told us that it was the last day of the Trinidad cultural week. So after dinner we headed out to explore and indulge in a spot of people watching.

 

Korina and magical animal

Trinidad street party

The next day we got into a conversation with the family's other son about the Cuban election, due to be held on the Sunday. Apparently in an election the Cuban people have the ability to vote for one party, the members of which are already in power. When we asked what the point was, the son replied jovially "yeah I know, it's crazy isn't it?!". I guess if you've never voted in a free election before, it's not something that you greatly miss if it is not available... 

Trip to Cuba - Playa Luna

Being weak as a kitten, I wanted to do nothing more than to sit on the beach and recover some strength. I couldn't really face the prospect of being sick in someone's house, so with some foreboding, we checked into a resort hotel.

Both hotels on the beach were all-inclusive. Not much good for me, as I could hardly eat, let alone drink - but I thought at least Korina could have a good night. However, the hotel bar couldn't even make a mohito - so the most expensive place we stayed was also the only place that was unable to do this. All of their booze was random unbranded stuff that apparently tasted like meths, and their water was very chlorinated. With my weak stomach, it was quite difficult to keep hydrated.

However, their beach was really good - so we enjoyed spending a day lazing about, enjoyed the occasional swim and went for a bit of a walk at one point.

My sunset phase continued (what else are you supposed to do if you are on the beach at dusk and too weak to do anything else?!)

 

Playa Luna

Bond shot of Korina

Sunrise at Playa Luna

Trip to Cuba - Cienfuegos

After a long, hot day in the car, finally we arrived at Cienfuegos. We stayed out at Punta Gorda - a 4km land spit that stuck straight out into the Bahia. After quickly grabbing a Casa, we headed down the road to the ostentatious yacht club "Club Cienfuegos" for a quick mohito before dinner. Korina talked me into trying the 7 year old Havana Club, and so after a couple of drinks we were well on our way.

 

Korina at Club Cienfuegos

Arising the next morning, we decided that we should check out the "centro" to see what Cienfuegos was all about. We grabbed a bici-taxi into town and cruised about for a couple of hours looking at all the classical buildings. Having had enough of this, we had a look in the Lonely Planet, which spoke highly about an old cemetary a little way out of the city.

What the guide book didn't mention is that it was quite a hike - over an hour through a very rough slum in the heat of the day. And when we got there, it was, well, a run down cemetary in the middle of nowhere. Not particularly interesting - bit of a waste of time really.

 

Korina at Reina cemetary

We then headed back into town - fortunately grabbing a bici-taxi to get out of the heat. We were intrigued by some of the local transport solutions...

 

Cuban public transport for kids

After getting back to Centro, we were pretty much exhausted from the heat and the walk. So we rocked up to a touristy hotel and enjoyed a few drinks and coffee by their pool. Again, being Government owned it was incredibly slow - but we were knackered so it was OK.

At this stage I was starting to feel a little ropey again, so a rest was a good thing.

As we headed back out the Punta Gorda, I noticed that Cienfuegos' favourite revolutionary seemed to be Che. Each town as we were travelling around seemed to favour one of the original 12, although pictures of Fidel were actually quite rare. Che was of course a popular choice, although Camillio was also quite popular. For me, it felt a little like some parts of South America where towns adopt various patron saints...

 

Che billboard

Back out at the Punta Gorda, and we headed to a restaurant in a weird moorish style building to have a drink and watch the sunset. Being on a point in a bahia, it was very beautiful and this started what I began to think of as my "sunsets phase" - look on my flickr to see how many shots I took!

 

Korina on Palacio de Valle

Korina and me at Palacio de Valle

Sunset at Cienfuegos

As the sun went down, things took a turn for the worse. The slight ropeyness I'd had for a number of days turned into a full blown vomitting attack. The only thing Korina could find in the casa for me to be sick into was a hat - which, rather disturbingly, she left in our room the next day once she had taken the plastic bags out of it. At one stage, I was vomitting so violently that I could not stand up. After a long, and not particularly lucid night, the fever seemed to break a bit. I still couldn't think about eating, but I was up and about.

I went to the doctors to get some more painkillers for my headache - this was the Western doctors (two medical systems - one for locals, one for tourists). It wasn't long before the doctor insisted on examining me - I would have to say that the doctor was friendlier, gave me the impression that he cared more and spoke better English than any doctor I have seen in the UK so far.

Interestingly, he also knew where NZ was, and where Wellington was within New Zealand - as well as that Edmund Hillary had just passed away. He kept saying "New Zealand eh? You are a valiant people".

In any case, he hooked me up with some relatively strong drugs, which meant that whilst not being 100% for the rest of the holiday, I was able to continue and enjoy myself a little.

As I was weak as a kitten, our next stop was Playa Luna...

Trip to Cuba - Playa Giron (Bay of Pigs)

On the way to Cienfuegos we detoured to have a look at the Bay of Pigs.

To get to the Bay of Pigs you leave the Motorway at the somewhat amusingly name Australia sugar mill - it was here that Castro had his headquarters during the invasion - and drive down a 30km straight, flat road through a swamp to the beach.

 

Bay of Pigs memorial

Although I don't know much about military strategy, it did seem to me that invading a part of Cuba that had only two roads and a 30km swamp buffer was an amazingly stupid thing to do. It was no surprise that Castro managed to bomb the supply ships, leaving 1,400 mercenaries stranded on the beach. He later traded them with the US for several million is food and medical supplies.

In any case, there is not much at the Bay of Pigs, and we didn't stay there for long. The beach is very pretty, and we stopped for a quick wade, but that was about it. Worth while going, but only on the way to somewhere else.

 

Beach at Bay of Pigs

Trip to Cuba - Vinales

Arriving in Vinales, it was not difficult to get a Casa Particular - in a town of 14,000 residents there are 300 casas. Casas are basically a room in a family's house, and we were to find them to be far cheaper than staying in hotels, far more welcoming and with better food (well, at least better tasting...).

The first day in Vinales we hired a couple of bikes and started to get the lay of the land. Both of our bikes were pretty rangi - the bottom bracket had so much lateral movement on both bikes that it felt like the whole thing could fall to pieces at any moment! Additionally, my rear wheel was pretty much oval. Nevertheless, we headed out in the country, stopping at a couple of caves before heading back to Vinales for lunch at the world's slowest peso pizza place. Nevermind, it was good to get out of the heat during the hottest part of the day.

 

Korina on the bike ride

 

Mogotes in the Cuban countryside

After lunch we headed out of town in the other direction. We found this crazy mural about the evolution of man. It was surreal, ugly and fascinating all at the same time. After looking at this for a but we headed back into town. One thing I like about bike riding is that it makes you a lot more accessible to people. On the way back, a lady came out of a house and invited us in for a drink.

 

Mural de la prehistoria

Having read that sometimes you find Campesimos in the country that hook you up, we decided to go for the drink. Unfortunately, after about 15 mins of broken Spanish later, it became apparent when the lady took Korina out the back to show her her baby, that what this was really about was trying to beg for money or clothes. We did give a couple of pesos for the juice and headed on our way.

The following day we had organised to go hiking with a local guide in the national park.

We started off by going through the tobacco fields (it was nearly harvest time) to our guide's uncle's farm. A quick juice and rum later, and we were off up through the bush to a cave/tunnel. Apparently this is where the locals used to hide during the hurricane season. After the cave it was back though the farms to Vinales.

Our guide had recently been to Gemany thanks to some of his other clients. After living his whole life in Cuba, it was apparently quite mind blowing to see how affluent other countries are - particularly in terms of the amount of stock shops like supermarkets have. Apparently it is possible for Cubans to travel overseas if they are invited by someone, but it does require the completion of a large number of forms and is quite expensive.

Our guide indicated that he was thinking about immigrating to England on a more permanent basis. However, it would seem that Castro has thought of this one, as if you want to immigrate from Cuba you cannot take your family - so he would have to leave his kids behind.

 

 

Tobacco growing in a field

Cave mouth

Amusingly, a random dog had decided to adopt us as we set off on the hike. It followed us for the best part of three hours on the walk before we managed to shake it out in the country somewhere. Not to be put off, it tracked us down later on that night in the town square.

Korina crosses the dodgy bridge

 

Korina and me in Vinales town square

I started feeling a bit ropey after the hike - so I had a bit of a lie down for a couple of hours and felt a lot better. The feeling was not to last...

The following morning we headed out of Vinales, back along the motorway to Havana then to Cienfuegos via the Bay of Pigs.

Trip to Cuba - Soroa

Pretty soon after leaving Havana we realised just how difficult driving in Cuba was going to be. There are NO street signs or any indication of where to go - pretty soon we resorted to stopping and asking for directions at every major intersection.

There is a motorway in Cuba - built in the 1980's with Soviet money. However, when the Soviet Union collapsed, construction stopped. What this means is that there are a whole heap of over passes that are not connected to the road, there are some places with no off ramps, and maintainence of the road is quite poor - with no road markings and frequent pot holes.

The lack of signage resulted in me getting on the wrong on-ramp at one point - pretty soon we were driving the wrong way down the motorway into oncoming traffic! Thankfully there were not many cars on the road, and doing U turns in the middle of the motorway is almost expected in Cuba!

As most Cuban's can't afford cars, Castro's solution has been to buy a whole heap of trucks which people stand on the back of. Failing this, people also wait around and hitchhike under motorway overpasses. Somewhat humorously, there is always a guy dressed in yellow, whose entire job is to marshall the cue to make sure everyone hitchhikes in an acceptable manner. We picked up a few hitchhikers, but were a little put off by aggressive touts in some places.

Our plan was to get off the motorway and check out the countryside by taking the back road to Vinales. So we headed up to Soroa where we paused for a time and when for a hike for a couple of hours up to the Mirador (viewing spot).

 

Korina on the peak at Soroa

 

View from peak at Soroa

 

Bird of Prey on the wing

 

Korina and me at Soroa

After Soroa, we were trying to go North along the Coast road to Vinales. We were therefore a little surprised and certainly very disoriented to find ourselves to the South, right next to the Motorway after following the map closely. It was then that we realised just how much of a rough approximation the maps are in Cuba. We had driven down a road that was not on the map, and this had resulted in us coming back the way we had come.

Working out that we were in fact in San Cristobel, we then headed off via the motorway to Vinales.

We had heard that the touts, or Jinteros, were particularly bad as you headed towards Pinar del Rio - however, we had not expected them to run out onto the motorway and force us to stop by standing directly in front of the car. They were very thoughtful informing us that the road to Vinales was shut due to works by the telephone company. However, it turned out that this was complete bullshit and they were just trying to get us to go with them so they could earn a commission on our night's stay. Luckily we ignored them and continued to Vinales without any further incident.

Trip to Cuba - Havana

Our initial plan had been to head over to Cuba for New Years - however, flights were going to be twice as much - so we waited a week or so and headed across the Atlantic mid-week.

After a 9 hour flight, we knew that we would be knackered, so we had organised a hotel for the first couple of days in Havana. As well as recovering from the flight, this also provided the opportunity to do a bit os sightseeing in Havana. After touching down mid afternoon and enduring our first, and very sketchy, taxi ride into town it took us ages to check in because the hotel had of course lost our booking - not great.

In a manner that was to become typical of Cuba, the Government owned and run places tended to be bureaucratic and not particularly friendly, whereas staying with the locals was an exercise in being looked after by friendly folks. After an hour or so of mucking around, the hotel managed to find a room for us, so we dropped our bags off and had a look around Havana Vieja - the old town.

 

Handy-man's dream

Most of the Colonial buildings that have been refurbished in Havana have been completed by a Government run company. They prioritise buildings based on their ability to generate CUC's (one of Cuba's two currencies, and the one that has a value outside of Cuba). The CUC's are reinvested both into new renovations, but also social services such as hospitals and education facilities for local Havana-ites.

Whilst in the central tourist area of Havana Vieja they have renovated quite a number of buildings, you do not have to go far before you are off the tourist trail, and can see how the locals live. Basically, heaps of the buildings a literally falling down around local families.

But people don't seem to let this get them down. They just continue on as best they can - and certainly, we never felt at risk, even when walking through some of the poorer areas of the city.

 

Korina makes friends with the Habana locals

So after looking around Havana Vieja we crashed out for the night. Next morning, our first tortilla (Cuban omelette with the prevalent queso and jambon) we crossed Havana Vieja and headed to Centro.

We spent a bit of time looking around the revolutionary museum - after living in essentially Western (and I guess a little pro-US) countries, it was really interesting to see Cuba's take on 20th century history as it affected the country. Of course there was a lot of propaganda - typically communist with a lot of graphics showing how all statistics had improved year on year since the revolution.

Interestingly, the Museum finished it's description of Cuban history in 1990 - just before the Soviet Union collapsed and their money stopped flowing into the country. What followed was a period of desparate poverty which explains much about the Cuban psyche today.

After the Museum we cruised around Centro, looked at the domed Capitol and drunk some weird non-alcoholic sugar cane juice with some locals in a back alley.

 

Capitol building

It was interesting that right behind the most ostentatious building in Cuba was what amounted to a junk yard - complete with broken down trains, cars in various states of (dis) repair and my favourite - a Lada with Ferrari decals!

Junk yard right behind the capitol

Lada with Ferrari decals

1950's taxis

 

After a long day in the sun, we cruised back to the hotel to find that our room had been made up, complete with a rather strange way of folding towels...

Bath towel swan

We crashed out for the night. Priority for the next day was grabbing our hire car and getting out of the big smoke of Havana. We grabbed a Coco-taxi and headed out on the road.

 

Coco taxi

 

Coco taxi ride

Coco taxi ride