We had 9 awesome days, followed by a night of suckdom where Cat was mugged, and a day in the Canadian consulate. But we're ok and Cat got a pretty hot photo on her emergency passport. Hotttt.

Shall I start at the top? Ok.

We started our trip with 4 days in Havana. On Sunday afternoons in Havana there is a party that happens in a street that's been entirely painted by a local artist. Folks gather for an afro-cuban jam, some dancing, rum and general good times. Conversation goes a little bit like this:

"Where are you from?"
"Canada."
"Do you like Cuba?"
"Yes, we're having a great time."
"Do you want to salsa?"
"No, thank you."
"Do you like to dance?"
"I'm a very bad dancer."
"It's ok, I can teach you."
"No, that's ok."
"Come on, it's easy."
"No really... I don't think you understand."
[Bust out the running man. Enjoy the new-found personal space.]

We even made some friends. They never saw the infamous running man, but they heard me sing Roxette. And still they walked with us.

On our last night in Havana we headed out for a "lovely" dinner at the "best" "paella" restaurant in Havana. I didn't know that the "best" paella was a big pot of rice cooked in a vat of brown goo with a few soggy green beans and chunks of chicken bone. And it certainly was a surprise when the paella started to come back up. Well, Cat's came back up. Mine came back out. Enough details? Let's just say that neither of us will be eating pooella again any time soon.

After that rough night in Havana, we headed west to Viñales. It's beauuuuutiful there... the town is in a valley surrounded by Mogotes, or pincushion mountains. We decided to go for a hike one day, up one of the mountains to visit the community of 'Los Aquaticos'. Wilbur, our fabulous guide, donned his tight denim cut-offs and knee-socks for the event. I donned my sunscreen, long-sleeve coverup shirt, and started to climb. And then I started sweating. Oh how I sweated. And my face went red, and I started to breath heavily, and then I got dizzy and felt like barfing. So we rested. And then Wilbur pushed me up the rest of the mountain. Me, so full of pride.

But the view at the top was totally worth it! And the lovely women in the house where we stopped to cool down and catch our breath brought us the most incredible glass of grapefruit juice, right from the tree. It was the most amazing juice I've ever had. Right up there with the joy of mini bananas. And that's serious.

On the way back down the mountain we perfected our Spenchglish. Wilbur spoke Spanish and quite a bit of French, plus a little English. Cat and I were working hard on our Spanish but we couldn't really get past the concept of what time we wanted to eat breakfast. So between the three languages we actually managed to have some lovely conversations with our main man Wilbur. He used to be a professional dancer but then he ate too much. (for real? for real.)

We'd let Wilbur teach us salsa any day. I wouldn't even bust out the running man for him. Rrrrrr.

The following day we explored some caves just outside of town. It was my first spelunking adventure. And how!

You got your stalagmites and your stalactites and the ones that come out from the side and the cauliflower shaped rocks and the disco glitter rocks and the ones that sound like timpanies. The hats were hot and when I grow up I want to be a spelunkologist.

Either that or build a "botanical garden" in my back yard and string creepy old doll heads from the trees. Oh wait... that's already been done.

Our hosts in Viñales, Berito and Margarita, are 2 of the loveliest women in all of Cuba. Seriously. Fantastic family. We love them. A lot.

At the end of our 4 days in Viñales we headed north to Cayo Levisa, a wee island off the north coast. On the minibus ride north we sat with Ben and Leona, 2 lovely Londoners, who had been on our spelunking journey the day before. We ended up spending much time with them on the beach. Fantastic storytelling, tasty mojitos, and many many laughs. In Cuba, es normal!

(it looks like i pasted cat's head onto my shoulder. i didn't. it grew like that naturally.)

Good times! Leona and Ben rock!

Sadly we had to leave them behind at the beach to get back to Havana in time for Cat to get mugged. It sucked, but Cat is terribly stoic, and everything was sorted out in time to catch our flight back home.

I guess that's all for now. There were many other stories but this will just have to tide you over til next time.

Peace out,
Avi G.