Day 9 – Trinidad

Due to the previous nights excesses with the local gut rot (I honestly had no idea a drink as bad as Havana Club came in 6 different varieties) I am feeling rather fragile today and decide a visit to the beach resort of Playa Ancon is about the most strenuous thing I can manage. However, the sun is blazing so I leave after about an hour and adjourn to a local bar.

The owner of the casa we are currently staying at seems to have also attended the Henry The VIII school of cookery and lays on a banquet in the evening with enough food to feed forty people – there were four. We are joined at dinner by Olga and Nadine (names fabricated for reasons about to be explained) from Russia, over the next two hours, they said one word to me (granted they may not have spoken English), completely ignored the cook (granted they may also have not spoken Spanish) and only exchanged two sentences with each other. I imagine the conversation went along the lines of "This is a lot of food Olga', "Yes Nadine this is a lot of food'.

I leave the chuckle sisters staring menacingly at their fruit salads before I get dragged any further into the conversation.

Cuban Street Snack League

1. Pizza – The kind of pizza you get in Cuba bears little resemblance to the kind you would find in a Milanese restaurant. In fact it looks more like a cheese sandwich that has been run over, still at 15p a pop who I am I to complain.
2. Pork rolls

Day 8 – Trinidad

A city on the southern coat of Cuba, where the fortunes that were made from sugar during the 19th century has long been spent while the city itself is largely unchanged with Spanish colonial houses of varying pastel colours colours lining the cobblestone hills – this is not the place to rent a bicycle.

Trinidad is the first city I have visited where restaurants charging the Cuban Peso sit side-by-side with restaurants charging the tourist Peso, it has dawned on me that rather than going to a tourist cafe and paying £1 for a pizza, if I go to the locals cafe the same pizza will cost just 15p.

There is a surprisingly large number of touts here (and in Cuba generally) attempting part you with cash for everything from substandard cigars that look great but are second-rate inside to restaurants that also look great but are second-rate inside and girls that look great, but… well you get the picture.

Cuban Beer League

1. Bucanero – A refreshing lively beer, perfect after a long day at the museum.
2. Cristal – A depressing lonely beer, perfect after a long day at the morgue.

This league table is unlikely to change as Bucanero and Cristal seem to be the only beers available.

Cuban Street Snack League

1. Pork rolls – Take one large dead pig (or a live one and kill it), spit roast the animal serve on freshly baked rolls with a chili sauce, all for 15p – beautiful.

Day 7 – Vinales to Trinidad

Another bus journey and I am treated to a show of communism in full force. I did not bother buying a ticket in advance, I simply turned up at 7am to get on one of the three different bus companies that were leaving within 30 minutes. Small thing – big mistake.

I explained that although we had not booked tickets in advance, we wanted to buy tickets for the half-empty bus that was parked a foot away.

I then admitted that as well as not booking tickets in advance we did not even have a reservation, but still we wanted to buy tickets for the half-empty bus that was parked a foot away.

Under pressure, I further confessed that I did not talk to the lady in the office about purchasing tickets, reserving tickets or indeed who may win the 3.30 at Aintree, but I would happily let the fella who was interrogating me whip me in the streets as long as he sold me tickets for the half-empty bus that was parked a foot away.

After scores of incredulous looks, much scratching of chins, several phone calls, a dog cocking his leg over Ciara's bag (I saw it off with a well aimed book) and a load of angry passengers asking what the bloody problem was, they sold us tickets.

On route to Trinidad I had great fun at a zoo causing chaos in the rabbit enclosure (it was not a big zoo) by chucking bits of banana to the bunnies and watching them go berserk.