Cuba, 5th-11th December

So, i have actually managed to find some reasonable priced Internet in Cuba so I will give you a brief update.
I arrived in to Havana last Friday (5th) and managed to find my way to my Casa Particular. In Cuba there are no cheap hostels to stay in, or even cheap hotels for that matter. Therefore the best places to stay are in rooms rented out in private homes, casas particulares. This is nice, because its good to stay with a local Cuban family. Although as I've found some are more friendly than others. The downside of this is of course not really being able to meet other travels, something which is especially important to me travelling on my own.
On Saturday morning I took a wander round the nearby plaza de la revolution. A huge open square, quite sovietesq really with big loud speakers positioned around the place. This is were Fidel used to hold rallies and make public addresses before he became to ill to do so. The plaza is dominated by the huge monument and statue of Jose Marti, Cuba's liberator. Unfortunately I couldn't go to the top of the monument as it was closed for refurbishment. I the afternoon I took the bus west to the small town of Vinales a few hours away. the next day I went on a guided walk around the surrounding countryside. It is a very pretty area with big limestone cliffs and lots of Tobacco fields. However due to the recent hurricanes here in Cuba a lot of the Tobacco crop was destroyed and also the houses they use for drying it. There is also a network of caves within the limestone hills, fun to explore but not quite as good as diving the Canecotes in Mexico.
Monday was spent travelling to the east of Havana and the town of Trinidad. This is a very pretty town (in fact a UNESCO world heritage site) with what are actually pretty lethal cobbled streets. Trinidad is famed for its music, and in the evening I went to a local bar with live music. It was your standard Cuban stuff really, but they also had a show of dance. This was really interesting as it came for the African slaves brought here by the Spanish, and therefore had an incredibly African feel to it.
I spent Wednesday wandering the streets of Trinidad and climbing the hill behind it for great views across the city to the Caribbean. There were a few museums there, but nothing to really hold your attention for that long. In the evening I took a bus to the city of Santa Clara.
Santa Clara is mainly famous for being the adopted home of Che Guevara after the revolution. Just outside the center of the city there is a large monument to him, again with a huge empty square in front of it. There is also a museum detailing his life as well as a mausoleum dedicated to him and his fellow Cubans who died in Bolivia. Its amazing how much he is revered here actually, you see far more images of Che in the towns and cities than you do of Fidel. I guess this (and the way he is an icon world wide) is mainly due to the way he was martyred by the CIA.
I also visited a small cigar factory in Santa Clara. Quite amazing to see about 150 people all lined up on benches rolling hundreds of cigars a day. Not a particularly fun job really, the whole set up looking incredibly old fashioned even with guards patrolling the benches to make sure employees don't steal any of the valuable cigars. Interestingly there was also a man at the front who's job it was to read the daily newspaper and notices to the workers over a loudspeaker.
I have now travelled back to Havana, and will be spending the last few days of my trip here before heading back home next week!
O