The trip to Santa Lucia, Cuba was better than I expected (see the Santa Lucia Cuba photo album). For $750 for two weeks at Club Amigo Mayanabo I really cannot complain. As I went alone, it was interesting to have to find friends and I did that all right

I met an older Cuban taxi guy (Rene) who seemed sincere and was going to drive me to Cocoa Beach where they serve lobster (the Cuba clawless kind). After some Canadians landed I got three couples to go with me and everyone had a good time. We especially liked the music from some friendly local musicians. One guy says he is the second John Lennon. We went there a few times; once we walked about 6 km down the dirt road and then were picked up for the last 2 km by a veggie cart pulled by a tractor; we weren't even hitchhiking!

I hung out with a family group of June, Barbie, Gloria and Bill and a couple Anna and Mike. There were other new friends like Terry, Murray, Paul, Robert, Milo, Nina, Barb and so on. The staff was friendly and I liked Ramon and Jose who thought I looked like his father. He called me ‘padre’ and I called him ‘hijo’ (=son, pronounced ‘ee-hoe’). Mike and I really liked Cocoa Beach and being entertained by the singers. Once we had six of them sing on the beach at sunset just for the two of us! We even experienced old versions of Spanish music like Quantanamera done in rap!

The weather was mostly poor with clouds for 6 days in a row and some torrential downpours. We kept busy playing Ping-Pong, chatting, drinking or whatever. When the sun was out it was great so I got a tan eventually. The beach was good to walk and I did that a few times for exercise and for an excuse to have a few beers and then sit in the sun.

I went out on a big catamaran (25 pesos) to the coral reef which is the second biggest in the world after the Great Barrier Reef in Australia. We snorkeled out there and saw lots of small fish.

The pool was excellent and fresh water. It is fun to sit around the pool and there was no shortage of chairs.

There were a lot of Cubans there; they get perks from the government to stay there and I think that the hotel workers resent it. They are mostly loud but OK. Apparently they destroyed a hotel next door called the Caracol.

The room was a bit of a disappointment although I had one that I liked because no one was to the right and the left wall did not have an adjoining door. So it was mostly quiet. The toilet would get bunged up with toilet paper and I'd have to call someone in to debung it. I talked to the cleaning lady in Spanish and decided that putting the used toilet paper in the waste bin was a solution. It is kind of disgusting but it worked for the last two days. The refuse can had a lid so there was no smell but it is not very sanitary! Anyway I did not get sick at all although some of my friends had a few little bouts.

The mattress had a nasty pin in the middle so I flipped it. Another bugaboo was that my TV would get tuned to maximum loud when I was out of the room and give me a blast when I turned it on. Once I came back and it was on full blast! There was a decent selection of channels like CNN, HBO, ESPN etc. There were also three Chinese channels and the English CCTV 9 that I remember from my trip to China.

The food was really quite good; apparently it is the best in Santa Lucia. They had huge legs of beef, big pork roasts with crackle, a number of turkeys and so on. I liked the veal stew, as it was tasty. In the old days Cuban cooking was bland to not offend anyone but now they are willing to experiment. The lobster at Cocoa Beach was the best I can remember. We paid 10 pesos at the Cocoa Beach bar and my travel agent said we could do a similar meal for 29 pesos. (1 peso is about 1US$). It pays to go underground!

We all went to the taxi driver's home for coffee one Sunday. The have running water, electricity and TV but the homes are pretty much shacks. The coffee is black and very tasty and served in demi-tasse cups.

Would I go back? I might as they seemed to be fixing things all the time to make it better. They were scraping the old paint off some buildings and repainting. My old hot and cold shower knobs were changed to new shiny ones while I was there. Maybe they could get new mattresses and recycle them to the poor Cubans. The weather definitely sucked but looks good this week – of course. I would like to do the crocodile tour and maybe the Camaguey tour (take Rene’s taxi for 140 peso for 7 people instead of the tour bus at 69 pesos a head!). However, I have my sights on Santiago sometime as I have not been it that area yet; I prefer the southern part of the island for the better weather.

Have a nice winter!