Bridget was kind enough to write another guest post:
Havana from Bridget
The Twister picked up some Californian crew in Havana on May 3. Elena and I flew via Mexico City and then hopped a cab to Marina Hemingway just west 15km from Havana. Lars greeted us at the Twister with hugs, smiles, and some cockpit cocktails. We headed into Havana that night in an early 1980s Russian delight of an automobile. Lars had made friends with a local, Joel, who offered us a ride to Havana and around for a reasonable fee. The Cubans that give us rides don't own their cars. Instead they pay a daily rental fee to the government to be a taxi driver and get a car we asked a few times and it seems about $30 USA is what the drivers pay per day to have a car. In route to Havana we stop at house to buy some fuel and we notice some basketball happening in the park. Lars gets him and me into a 3-on-3 basketball game. Our team is a Cuban, Lars and myself versus 3 Cubans who were on the court when we approached. We (Lars and I) play barefoot, because flip-flops were the only other options. Elena was team photographer. Fun times.
Post-game we head to Havana to have a wander about the old city. There are lovely streets to meander, plenty of mojitos, and music filling the air. The architecture is beautiful, but often crumbling after years of neglect. The city is a fabulous place for a stroll for around every corner and down every street there is a scene that is unique and engaging with bright colors, wonderful people, countless things unexpected and often a Cuban soundtrack.
We spend 3 days wandering about Havana. Cuba has fine museums for art, music, history, etc, and those things likewise fill the streets. Our days are simply walking and seeing some sights shared by many tourists such as the Hotel National, Plaza de la Revolución ("Revolution Square"), Havana University and natural history museum, a walk along the Malecón (officially Avenida de Maceo) a broad esplanade and seawall which stretches for 8 km (4 miles) along the coast with waves breaking across the sidewalk, and we Remember the Maine (a monument). We learn to purchase some meals not from tourist restaurants, but to focus on little windows on the side of buildings that offer random cheap sandwiches and after a few days Lars can typically get all three of us a meal for about $1 US total. While a meal at a restaurant cost typically $5-$8 per person. We learn that Cuba Libre is the proper term for a rum and coke in Cuba too. Classic cars are a common sight and one night we catch a ride back to the marina in a 1941 Plymouth. It felt like a scene out of an old gangster movie.
We are invited to Joel's (our driver/friend) family's home for dinner. Elena, Lars, and I are picked up by Joel and taken to what I imagine is a typical Cuban home. It was a wonderful evening. The house is small and simple and full of aunts, cousins, and a few friends stop by. We are given a nice meal of pork, rice/beans, taro, and some veggies lettuce, tomatoes, and cucumbers. We end up in the small yard with Lars playing guitar, good conversations, and appreciating the good, cheap, and plentiful rum of Cuba until 3am. We did a few sing alongs with Mahna Mahna (Do doo be-do-do) from Muppet Show. It was a wonderful to spend an evening as part of a family.
One day we stay near the Twister at the marina. We chat with a couple other cruisers and get a sense of Cuba from a sailor’s point of view. One boat has sailor that has sailed between Cuba and the USA numerous times. He gives us some pointers and also suggests we walk a few miles to a local mosaic artists home. So after a swim and a few jumps off the giant (8 meter/25 ft) inflatable iceberg at the marina. Lars, Elena, and I walk to the neighborhood of local artist Jose Fuster. It is an incredible display of public art. Much of the neighborhood has been transformed into a colorful mosaic that makes one smile. We wander slowly the streets, toss a frisbee, pet a few dogs, and share an ice cream.
One day we stay near the Twister at the marina. We chat with a couple other cruisers and get a sense of Cuba from a sailor’s point of view. One boat has sailor that has sailed between Cuba and the USA numerous times. He gives us some pointers and also suggests we walk a few miles to a local mosaic artists home. So after a swim and a few jumps off the giant (8 meter/25 ft) inflatable iceberg at the marina. Lars, Elena, and I walk to the neighborhood of local artist Jose Fuster. It is an incredible display of public art. Much of the neighborhood has been transformed into a colorful mosaic that makes one smile. We wander slowly the streets, toss a frisbee, pet a few dogs, and share an ice cream.
TRINIDAD from Bridge. May 7-9
On May 7 (Bridget’s Birthday) after a morning of coffee and mango on the Twister we head to Trinidad, an old colonial city on Cuba’s south Caribbean coast. We hired a car and a driver although Lars also had some time behind the wheel. We passed fields of sugar cane, corn, taro, and groves of huge mango trees galore. We took the long way to Trinidad, which allowed us to drive along the Bay of Pigs (Bahía de Cochinos) and stop for some snorkeling among Cuban corals. The water was gorgeous and warm. The reef was lovely and the highlight were the bright and colorful Christmas Tree Worms that are quite numerous on the coral heads. We continued to travel across the countryside and past numerous Cuban billboards that celebrate the achievements of the revolution, their successful defeat of Yankee imperialism and occasionally condemns the USA blockade. The number of cars decreases significantly as one travels away from Havana and are replaced by horse with carts and bicycles. Cuba is a fascinating place for a drive. The evening drive corresponded with a crab migration across the road. The crabs are quite brave and instead of running unfortunately try to fight the car with their claws to no avail.
We arrive late evening to Trinidad. We have a room in a Cuban home that is an official homestay. The government regulates everything, so you are only allowed to stay at particular houses. We shower and have a bit of down time in the house courtyard. Lars finds a guitar to add music to the evening as Elena paints and I write. We head out around 10pm and find live music and dancing in the town square among the cobblestone streets. We dance the night away with mojitos and Cubanitos as fuel :-) Cubanitos are a Cuban version of a Bloody Mary.
The next two days are spent exploring Trinidad an incredibly well preserved old city dominated by Spanish colonial architecture and is a UNESCOs World Heritage site. The days are simply spent wandering about aimlessly along the cobblestone streets, tossing the Frisbee, and sitting in parks listening to music. There are few cars here, but plenty of horses. We meet a fantastic artist name Francisco by walking into his studio/home. He discovers that I share his birthday, so he insists on sharing a spot of rum and a cheers! After the first pour of rum he fills our glasses with rum and red wine, which is a Cuban sangria. We play his piano and admire his art including a large Saint Lázaro painting, which was the name Lars often used when introducing himself in Cuba. We share a plate of Cuban sausage and veggies. We swapped tales and Francisco listened with all his heart and seemed memorized by Lars’ story of sailing the oceans. Francisco is fellow dreamer and kindred spirit who longs to sail the seas, but he born in a land that will never give him the freedom to sail away. We depart with smiles, hugs, parting words of wisdom, a photo of Francisco with his address on the back, and all three of us with a seed bracelet as a gift. That late afternoon we head to a nearby beach, Playa Ancón. We snorkel the eel-grass beds and find a sea snake and few lobsters, but not much else. Most of the time is spent tossing the Frisbee and enjoying a beautiful sunset. That evening more music and dancing!
The next afternoon after a city walkabout we head back to Havana on the same route so we snorkel the Bay of Pigs with the Christmas Tree Worms. We stop for dinner a seafood restaurant and are offered crocodile as an option, but choose not to eat the endangered species. The sun sets while we eat, so the final hours of the drive are under a star filled sky with fireflies lighting up the trees.
Havana to Florida from Bridget
We spend one more day (May 10) in the marina, scrub the Twister’s hull, and depart late the night of May 10 sailing towards Florida. We motor through most of the first night with a little sail assist. We rotate through 2-3 hour watches. The night sky at sea was beautiful with shooting stars and a little sliver moon starts the evening with us before it sets a few hours after sunset. The days are sunny and warm as we cruise merrily (more or less) along wearing our new Cuban straw hats. We stay cool by dropping a bucket overboard and hulling it in to be dumped on us in the cockpit. Lars has the ability to hang on to the rail of the boat and drag along with one hand as we are underway for more of a real swim, but Elena and I stick with the bucket in the cockpit. Later in the day when we are finished with salt water buckets we each get a freshwater rinse from our 6 gallon water container on deck. We play scrabble, have sing alongs, take naps, spot a turtle, a shark or two, and lots of flying fish. On Day 2 of the sail we fly the colourful asymmetrical spinnaker. We eat beans and rice, rice with Thai curry, oatmeal, and Lars cooks up tapioca pancakes that he learned to do in Brazil.
We are sailing towards Goodland, Florida that is situated among the 10,000 islands of Florida mangroves and sandbars, which is an area well known for boats running aground. There is sailor saying that has many renditions, but basically is summed up with this quote
"Only two sailors, in my experience, never ran aground. One never left port and the other was an atrocious liar." Don Bamford
At midnight 5 miles from Coon Key and 7 miles from our final destination still seemingly the “middle” of the ocean we run aground. The navigational charts don’t show any water that shallow, but we managed to find it. Captain Lars handles it well and gets us off the sandbar and he kindly doesn’t mention the sharks that were circling the boat until we are safely underway. We change routes and sail north to the Marco River. And after a few more shallow water encounters we safely arrive at the dock in Goodland, Florida early afternoon about 60 hours after we untied the dock lines in Havana. Lars stepped on to USA soil for the first time in 25 months. We successfully completed another amazing adventure in a unique land and exploring new seas with Lars and the Twister!
The pessimist complains about the wind; the optimist expects it to change; the realist adjusts the sails. - William A. Ward
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