12 January Vinales

Together with Linda and Chris from Mon Ark, our fellow prisoners of the weather, we hired a car and driver for a day for a trip to Vinales national Park which is described in our guide as 'one of the crown jewels of the Cuban National park System'. We took the first ferry of the day from Cayo Levisa to the ferry dock on the mainland where we were allocated our car, a modern yellow taxi, which took an hour and forty five minutes to reach Vinales town and then we swapped to a local taxi for our tour.

Vinales valley

Vinales town is in a high valley surrounded by limestone mogotes (in south America they would be called mesas, tables). Tourists come to see the limestone caves, take in the views, see a tobacco plantation, the energetic to rock climb, cycle and ride horses. We oldies with only a day let Jose chose to show us his choice of which not all would have been my pick. His number one spot was the Prehistoric mural. It was clearly seen from the road as we drove between the fields, a towering wall of colourful rock. The entrance fee was $3 each and the car park was full with cars and tour buses. We walked up the path to the rock wall. It is a very recently painted mural of dinosaurs, turtles and a naked couple. I still expected to see a cave with paintings done by early man thousands of years ago. Wrong. The modern painting was the attraction, the clue was in the title 'Prehistoric mural' - a painting of dinosaurs. I felt cheated while the other tourists seemed very happy and stayed longer to take horse rides around the field, or climb onto the back of a Brahma bull. I never did found out why there are Brahma cattle in the middle of Cuba.

the prehistoric mural

saddle up and ride

traditional role of working bulls

Recovering from disappointment I hoped our next stop would be more elevating. It was, up a hill to a look out point at Hotel Jazmine. We looked, took a picture or two, including a resting Brahma bull wearing a saddle and bridle, climbed back into the car and went down into the valley and back up to another hotel for another look out opportunity. Perhaps our driver thought we might like to have a drink or lunch. It was lunchtime so we went back down the hill to a restaurant in the pretty little town.

Post lunch we took in a tobacco ranch where we learned about growing, harvesting and curing before a demonstration of rolling a cigar. This was a family business and most interesting. I didn't know that leaves taken from different levels on the plant have different flavour characteristics and that the nicotine is concentrated in the centre vein of the leaf. This operation removed the nicotine vein to avoid addiction, noting cigar smoking should be about the taste in your mouth and not an addiction. It should be an occasional treat. We watched the hand rolling and it was fast, neat and consistent. When it came to the selling and how many would we like to buy we were also consistent in declining.

rolling a cigar

Our last visit of the day was to the Caves of the Indians. David and I have seen many, many limestone cave systems in our travels which makes us tough judges. What did we think about this one compared to the extensive systems in South Africa, or New Zealand, or Thailand? It was pleasant and the ten minute ride in a boat at the end out of the cave was nice. Heck it only cost $5 so no big shakes and if we hadn't seen it we might have missed the best cave ever. What was the best in our experience? A close call between the glow worm caves in north island, NZ and Crocodile caves in Koh Tarutao, Thailand.

cave of the indians

From the caves we returned to town for a coffee, or a chilled sangria, at the Cinema cafe. Our waiter Frederico spoke excellent English and when David asked how he had learned he explained he'd taken a six month intensive course. Waiting was what he did to supplement his income while he was studying at Vinales university to be a doctor. We talked more, asking about his studies and ambitions. He said when he had qualified after 6 years' studying he would earn $40 a month. We'd paid $120 for a car and driver for the day. Frederico called it a 'contradiction', that a doctor earned less than a taxi driver, but he wasn't upset. It was simply a contradiction.

By now it was late in the afternoon now and the last ferry back to Levisa left at 6pm, time for taxi man put pedal to metal and us back to the coast. It had been an interesting day. We were pleased to see the interior of the country, to see farms, goats and chickens and very nice to spend a day with friends simply being tourists.