Steven’s Cuba Blog

Cuba Chronicles, Chapter One

November 21, 2005 at 6:21 am | In Trip Report |

GENESIS

Sitting in the lobby at Pierre-Elliott Trudeau Intl., August 27th, 2005, 5:45 PM.
Well, this trip is off to a great start - the Cubana Aviacion flight’s been delayed 2 hours until 8pm. Which means that I won’t be in Havana until midnight. Normally, this wouldn’t be a problem, but the fact that I’ve got 60kg of equipment with me means that I won’t be taking the bus to the city, and will have to settle for a $20 CUC Taxi. I’d been planning this bicycle trip for a long time - nearly a year, to be precise. It was originally supposed to be a purely personal trip - a sabbatical, if you will. However, as the departure date was nearing, it turned out that one of the projects I had been working on for a while had taken on some Cuban members, and I could get a chance to work with them for a few days before starting my bicycle trip across the island. So the plan was 5 days of “work” in Havana, and then 6 weeks of bicycle travel as far east as I wanted to go, then backtracking to Havana, and maybe heading out west to Pinar Del Rio and Vinales, time permitting.

On board Cubana Flight 170 to Havana, August 27th, 2005, 11:30 PM.
Approaching Jose Marti Intl. airport, it’s immediately clear - even from the plane - how radically different Cuba is from any other place on Earth. While Montreal from the sky was lit up with street lights, skyscrapers, and car headlights, much of Havana is shrouded in darkness. Looking up at the starry sky and looking down at the city are in fact not very different - both give the impression of a backlit canopy with holes punched through it. Which is to say, peaceful and beautiful.

As the aircraft’s landing gear deploys - and its metal parts start clanging - I down my Crystal Cerveza and a flurry of thoughts that I had managed to subconsciously avoid so far start coming to mind:

• What the hell am I - a Canadian / Iraqi-Assyrian (CIA?) - going to do in Cuba for 2 months?
• I’ve never biked this far before, not even at home, and especially not for weeks at a time. What if my bike breaks down in between cities? What if I get injured?
• Did I bring enough money? What about credit cards? What if I get robbed?
• What am I going to do with my Powerbook? Carry it in my backpack through 35+ celsius degrees heat in direct sunlight while biking for hours at a time?

These questions plague me for about 30 more seconds, and then my cooler side bitch-slaps my nervous side and convinces me to relax. I’ll do whatever I want in Cuba - I have no other agenda than to learn, and have fun. If the bike breaks, it breaks. Cuba’s got a fantastic inter-city bus system. I won’t get robbed - I’m a bearded, heavily tattooed, dark-skinned muscular guy wearing ragged clothes. I’ve got enough money, and my powerbook will have to put up with the heat or STFU and die. ’nuff said.

Sorry to bore you, but the landing, disembarkation, customs and taxi ride to my casa were all woefully uneventful. I exited the air-conditioned plane into a scorcher of a Havana night, with the recent rainfall still hanging in the air. I changed some money to about $100 CUC, then I walked through the “nothing to declare” portal with my huge bicycle crate on the wagon - which could’ve contained many non-bicycle related items - with not so much as a second glance. The predicted $20 taxi to the Vedado district was fine as well, but was also a rude awakening to the fact that my spanish is nowhere near as good as I thought it was.

When I got to the casa, the popular owner - known as the “casa mafia” in Havana - told me that he had no space for me, even though I had reserved a full month in advance. He sent me downstairs to a neighbor’s home, which was dilapidated but spotless. It wasn’t worth anything near the $30 he was charging me, though. I’ll stay here for 5 days, then likely leave Havana early and make up for the lost time on the way back.