Our first job today was to organise our transport out of Havana & it managed to be done before breakfast! Maria called & booked a taxi for me to the airport and mum organised with the other people staying at our casa for a lift to Varadero as they were picking up a hire car and going there anyway. For something different we went & had a buffet breakfast at the Hotel Florida for 7CUC which was ok & provided a few extra options from our normal breaky. Further up Obispo street we walked around Parque Central for some pictures of the theatre & capital building then after some to-ing & fro- ing hired a classic car for 30CUC for a one hour tour around Centro Havana. It was a pink convertible 1965 olds mobile & luckily the driver spoke good english as he was actually trained as a lawyer. After looking at Revolution square & driving through some other suburbs we stopped at Hotel Nacional for a Mojito out on the terrace overlooking the Malecon and with views to old Havana & then returned to Parque Central via the Malecon with waves splashing over the retaining wall for dramatic effect. Weaving our way back through the streets we stopped at 2 supermarkets, neither of them had water & any goods they did have on the sparsely filled shelves were very expensive. A plastic cereal container was 12cuc & an ugly plastic hand soap pump in the shape of a pink elephant was 9.45cuc. We finally managed to buy a 5 litre water at a restaurant for only 3CUC & no queueing was involved. Returning to the casa for a siesta for an hour or two we then walked up our street instead of down looking for some internet & ended up in a different hotel then went for dinner at the good coffee restaurant for dinner, although they had run out of the yummy garlic butter (instead gave me mayonnaise to go with the bread?) & still provided fairly ordinary service but did have wine in stock & the food was still good. We returned to the casa via the cathedral square for one last look as it seems almost magical at night. We realised our time in Cuba was coming to an end, well more so for me. Although first impressions were not necessarily positive it certainly grew on us once we learnt patience & to pay for time saving convenience. I'm glad I made the (expensive) effort to see Cuba now as soon it enough it may not recognise itself. A lot was crammed into the 8 days but I'd like to think we got a good sense of Cuban life with its queueing, shortages & hopeful outlook.