Santiago de Cuba to Baracoa (March 17)

After breakfast we convened in a conference room at the hotel to meet with Professor Marta Cordies to discuss Afro-American culture and traditions in Cuba.  She was an informative and engaging speaker. 

Leaving the hotel, we prepared to storm San Juan Hill.  Now an urban area, I had trouble conjuring up a vision of Teddy Roosevelt and his Rough Riders charging up it.  Amusingly, I had better lunch envisioning Teddy and his boys riding the nearby Ferris wheel (bottom picture).

 It is noteworthy that throughout the half-century of sour relationship between the USA and Cuba, the monument to US soldiers who died in the battle remained standing.

We had a sidewalk photo op at the former Bacardi - think rum - mansion.  Initially the family strongly supported the revolution.  The Bacardis donated huge amounts of money to it.  The family helped keep the CIA from meddling in it.  Bacardis spoke out publicly in favor of it.  These acts did not save the family from having their business nationalized.  This had nothing to do with Cuba's nationalizing USA-owned businesses as tensions grew between the two countries.  Bacardi was a Cuban-owned business.  After seizing foreign businesses, the revolutionary government decided to seize control of all businesses.  

The Bacardi family left Cuba.  The pendulum swung the other way.  The family became ardent enemies of the revolutionary government.  For example, it supported of the 1996 Helms-Burton Act that expanded the Cuban embargo.       

We were off the bus again at the former Moncada (army) barracks, now a school, that Fidel Castro and a handful of others attacked on July 26, 1953.  Although the attack was a complete failure, the date became the name of Castro's revolutionary organization - Movimiento 26 de Julio; M-26-7.  The 60-year-old bullet holes in the building (left-hand side of second picture) were remarkably preserved. 

School picture day?

Our next destination was Morro Castle. 

It was an impressive fortress.  Given its size and location, it no doubt discouraged the most brazen adversary from trying to enter the narrow mouth of the harbor.  

 

 

Just outside the fort we had lunch at El Morro.  A major attraction at the restaurant was the chair John Lennon sat in when he ate there.  The plates and cutlery he used were also on display.

It was now time to board the bus for the long drive to Baracoa.  

After passing through Guantanamo we stopped at a rest area that included an observation post from which to view the US Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay.  It was so far off and the view so hazy that I did not bother taking a picture.  I was able to provide some rudimentary information about its layout having been there twice some forty years ago while in the US Coast Guard.

The rest stop did have flush toilets without running water.  Instead it had walking water.  You paid the woman to get a bucket of water from the well and pour it into the toilet. 

Onto the bus for the next leg of the ride. 

This took us as far as a rest area where the bus topped off its fuel tank.  The reason given was that the fuel pickup in the tank was poorly located.  If the tank was not full, on a steep incline, the engine could run out of fuel even though there was plenty in the tank.

The stop was an opportunity to use the facilities (no water this time), get something to drink and stretch our legs.  The group wiped out the store's supply of ice cream bars.

The bus turned inland and began a long, twisting climb up the mountains followed by an equally convoluted descent. These were the Sierra Maestra Mountains where Fidel Castro and his followers hid after being attacked by Batista forces soon after disembarking the GRANMA, boat Fidel et al arrived in from Mexico.  

The road was called La Farola (The Lighthouse).  It was built in the 1960's.  Prior to that time, travel to Baracoa was primarily by boat.  The road was a reward for Baracoa's support of the revolution.

We rolled into Baracoa as night fell, going straight to Hotel Porto Santo.  We had dinner while the bags were being offloaded and taken to our room.  The room accommodations were modest and well-worn, but the room was clean and comfortable. It did not take us long to crawl into bed.