Travel Wisdom, Lessons, and Reflections from a New Year’s Eve in Santiago de Cuba, 1989 Some trips entertain you.Some trips relax you.And some trips — usually the ones that don’t go as planned — leave you with the kind of travel wisdom you carry for the rest of your life. My week in Cuba in 1989 was one of those trips. It began with confusion and disappointment: a rocky beach, a resort short on towels, a diving fatality just days before I arrived. But somewhere between moped adventures, stone dinosaurs, bread lines, and a New Year’s Eve lobster feast grilled over an open flame, Cuba …
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Santiago de Cuba, Cayo Granma, and the New Year’s Eve That Changed Everything
The Day We Went Off the Resort Map to Explore Santiago de Cuba and the Island of Cayo Granma We met another couple at the resort who understood a simple truth about 1980s travel: if you want to really see a place, you ask the people who live there. They spoke to the towel attendant — a woman with a warm smile and a calm confidence — and asked if she knew anyone who gave private tours on their day off. She did.And she was available.She even arranged a driver. That’s how four tourists climbed into a small, spotless taxi early one morning, a black Mercedes with a white roof that looked …
Climbing Gran Piedra & Exploring the Cuban Countryside
A Day That Felt Like Stepping Inside Cuba’s Soul After the moped adventure, I thought nothing else on this trip could surprise me. I was wrong. We signed up for a bus tour to a location called Gran Piedra. It was the kind that promises “local sights” and “authentic experiences,” though you never really know what that means until you’re in the middle of it. The road carried us deep into the Cuban countryside, weaving through farmland, palm groves, and rolling hills. Tiny houses dotted the landscape, some leaning from age, most painted in bright colours that had faded with time. We passed …
The Moped Adventure in Cuba That Changed Everything
Up until this point, the trip had been a mix of surprises and small disappointments — rocky beaches, rationed towels, food that didn’t quite agree with me. But everything shifted the morning we finally got our hands on two mopeds and set out on a moped adventure in Cuba! We woke before sunrise, arrived early enough to beat the quiet 7 a.m. race for supplies, and managed to claim two mopeds in excellent condition. I didn’t know it while I drank my morning lime juice, but this moped adventure in Cuba would become one of the most surreal and unforgettable days of my life. Riding Into an …
The Cuba Resort That Wasn’t Expected
When I booked my Cuba resort in the late 1980s, I imagined something similar to my Dominican Republic trip — soft sand, turquoise water, and maybe a little diving if I was able. But stepping into the southeast corner of the island quickly taught me that this wasn’t Varadero, and this wasn’t the kind of Cuba most travelers talked about. Arriving at a Cuba Resort on the “Other Side” of the Island I wanted soft beaches, turquoise water, long days drifting between the ocean and a beach chair. That expectation vanished the moment I walked down to the shoreline. The “beach” was a …
