Bienvenida a nuestra final instalment de Cuba, tierra de salsa, canción, y puros. We left Cayo Santa Maria with mixed feelings; it had been a very relaxing 3 days with the nicest room, best shower and everything easily available (except internet and phone access!) but we knew that it wasn't the 'real' Cuba and so were happy to get back to the sights, sounds and smells of the laughing locals, their music and the dogs, chickens and horse and carts. We made date...

Retrasado estaciones saludos de su intepida viajandro corresponsales! Leaving Camaguey we shared a taxi with a couple from the Czech Republic to Santa Clara. He was a climber who fell 50 metres down a mountain some years ago breaking his back and both legs. He had recovered sufficiently to resume climbing but still needed a further operation on a badly set and swollen ankle. His wife or girlfriend who had consumed too many mojitos the night before, he told us...

Una ves mas calido saludos de su viajando amigos! Unfortunately we had no luck getting the photos on. We managed to get wifi cards (the first we´ve found in Cuba) in Baracoa and sat in a Government run cafe but couldn´t get onto any .com websites! We also haven´t been able to look at gmail since leaving England. We got the bus back over the mountains from Baracoa to Santiago where we stayed one night and enjoyed a chip sandwich with a cocktail and a beer i...

Jose Maria Olazabel from Baracoa! Leaving Trinidad behind we had a 12 hour bus ride eastwards to get us to Sandiago de Cuba, the country´s second largest city, which is closer to Haiti and Jamaica than it is to Havana. We haven´t mentioned the Cuban revolution yet and Santiago isn´t a bad place to start as it was here in 1953 that it all kicked off. Living conditions in the 1950s for the majority of people here were very poor - there was a chronic housing s...

Queridos amigos y familiares, hola otra vez de soleado Cuba. Moving on from Vinales we made the mistake of taking a taxi to Trinidad de Cuba rather than the bus. The draw was that it was a shorter journey, 7 hours compared to 9 hours on the bus, and was from door to door. This would have been great except that another couple joined us so it was very cramped. The taxi driver also wasn't as safe as the driver on the bus and we kept seeing him watching the DVD s...