Fabzgy’s Life

The Challenge:
Get from “Moron“, Ciego de Avila to “Caibarièn”, Villa Clara

It looks on the map as if it is less then 100 km. We, my travelbuddy Alex and me, wanted to make this distance with a low budget in order to figure out how the cubans mamage to get from A to B in Cuba. Thats means Taxis are not allowed and car rentals either!

So we had variouse options I would like to present to you.

Option 1: National Buses (Astro)
There is a bus which is going from Moròn at 1 pm to Santa Clara. One day it pases by Remedios, so it takes the north route and the other day the bus takes the central road so we would have to switch buses in Santa Clara (arrival 5 pm) to another bus which brings us to Moròn.
Problem: The woman at the counter says that she is not authorisized to sell tickets to foreigners. Not even in “divisas”. She is the one wh recomends us the oficial option 2.

Option 2: The oficial one
Go with a municipality bus to Ciego de Avila. Take a taxi or walk for 1 hour (in a unsuportable heat with all your luggage) to the Viazul Terminal. Hope that there is still a free seat in the only bus which is leaving Ciego de Avila at 4:40 pm and gets to Santa Clara at 7:30 pm.
Problems: 1. At the time we get to Santa Clara there isno connection bus to Caibarièn so we ve got to stay overnight in Santa Clara. 2. We don t know if the Viazul has space for us. 3. We can t make reservation for the Viazul, not via Inet nor via Phone 4. Thats the normal/oficial way and hardly payable for cubans.

Option 3: Hitchhiking and Local/Municipality Buses
We could try to get through with hitchhiking and trying to hop on local transportation. That would reqire us to use three local buses and the probability that these are leaving more then twice a day is close to cero. So you miht catch the first one but will me stuck in the next town maybe for a day…
Okay so we hitchhike if there is no transportation. The problem ith hitchhiking is that there are very few private cars in general and the drivers are afraid to get a fine if they take foreigners because as a tourist you are supposed to rent your own car or go by taxi. Aditionally there are a lot of cuban hitchhikers and drivers always ask for money -sometimes uite a lot if they figure out that you are not cuban. By the way I suld mention that the Tropical Storm “Fay” is over Cuba in that moment and heavy rain showers are very likely.

Option 4: Train & Bus
At 1:20 pm there is supposed to be atrain to Santa Clara which could drop us of close to Caibarièn. When we got to the train station the it turned out that the Tropical Storm “Fay” has washed away a bridge so the train has to go on another track but it still should arrive in Santa Clara around 5 or 6 or 7 or 8 and sth. pm.
Instead of 1:20 pm we left at 3:45 pm, so almost 2,5 hours after we should have left.
we ended up paying 10.5 Pesos Moneda Nacional which is around 0.40 € and this was still twice the price then cubans payed.

In the rain there are plenty of people selling food, soaps, toothbrushes, cheesebatterys, etc. to the passengers. It s like alitle market. In the little villages we stop the local try to sell there products (fruits, cheese, eggs, …) to the passengers. before we left the train statio I was reading an article of the Granma about the punctuality of the trains. Accoring to the article 85 % of the trains were in time. Accorng to the cubans in the train the train has never arrive in time on this line.
Finally we arrived at 0.30 am in Santa Clara.
There people told us that at 2am a bus leaves to Caibarien from the train station. Allright .. we get some food and hopp on the bus - no problem. At 2 am three wasn t any bus. Then they told us that at 4 am another bus is supposed to arrive. Nothing happened. At 6 am there came finally a bus which brought us over to Caibarien where we finally git a 7.45 am in the morning the day after we left Moròn. The last bus we took was a bus which brings employees to the Cayos (touristic islands) and we ve had to talk the bus driver over to carryus because thats probably not allwoed either.

So finally it took us 22 hurs to figure out a way to go from Moròn to Caibarièn. A distance of probably less then 100 km. We could have just rent a car or take a taxi but then you wouldn t have anything to read …

I did it. I escaped Cuba by boat.
Alex, my travelbuddy and me came back on Friday night to La Habana. On Saturday morning I ve called the Marina Hemingway and they told me that there is a french guy leaving with his boat.
I couldn t believe it. A few days before I ran into a couple from Israel who stayed several weeks in the Isla de las Mujeres in Mexico to find a boat to Cuba and finally came by plane - Hurricane Season! Nobody wants to travel now on th Golf of Mexico.
So after I ve heared about the boat which was supposed to leave to Mexico I showereed brushed my teeth and made my way with public buses to the marina. Over there I had to wait like two hours before Gerome and his buddy Bill showed up. After a few sentences they accepted me as a crew member. I couldn t believe it.
After a last supper with my Cuban / English Family I came with all my stuff on Sunday morning to the Marina. After checking the last things we took off and with minimal problems at the Inmigration (I m impressed of the Cuban Intelligence Service) we took of - course South/West - Destination Cancun! During our trip I was steering the boat every two hours for an hour and it was exiting to be on this ocean with this tiny boat.
After 48 hours on the boat we arrived today (Tuesday) at noon in Cancun / Isla Mujeres. After we did all the migration tramits I took of to Merida where I am now…

If you ve heared nothing about that storm - ignore this message.

I f you ve heared or read about it and you were worried abut me - thanks but eveything is allright.

There was quite a bit of rain in the last few days but we managed more or less to be out of the worst areas when the storm passed.

In 4 to 5 days I m gonna be back in La Habana and check my possibilities for the hitchhike a boat from the Hemmingay Marina somewhere to the american continent.

So keep on rocking … more when I m back in easy InetAcessArea.

Like I wrote Inet is expensive here.
I m now in Cienfueos and this Computer does not work with my memory stick.

I don t have a flight out of Cuba so far … I m going to hitch a boat from the Marina Hemingway in La Habana in the end of themonth.-.. lets see where I m gonna end up …

Hope it s gonna work
Viva la Revolucion!