14/04/2019 – Walking tour, Vinales, Cuba

We got up for an 0800 breakfast (our earliest start since we last went to work I think, although, not very surprisingly, it seems getting up for an excursion is a lot easier than getting up for work!). We got sorted then headed to the centre of the village to meet our tour guide. He picked the two of us up, and we commenced a 4 hour walking tour through the Vinales national park. I think we got lucky with our tour guide who has lived in this UNESCO national park his whole life. He knew so much about the local flora and fauna (Josh is still trying to work out what this phrase means) and is also the expert bird guide for the park. He seemed to be friends with everyone here, and even other tour guides stopped us to tell us we had the best guide! We walked from the village down into the valley, a route we hadn’t found yet, and the whole way our guide was greeting people and pulling fruit and flowers and leaves from the nearby plants and trees. Our first pitstop was a tiny little farmhouse that specialised in coffee. We were shown how the coffee beans grew and then how they were skinned, roasted and then ground. Then we got to taste it - it was absolutely delicious! They fill reused plastic water bottles to sell them. Then we continued on the walking tour, all the way walking through the vast green mountainous landscapes dotted with tobacco houses and small farmhouses, smallholdings with chickens, horses, pigs, Ox and bull.

One of various farm houses along our walk.

We got to a tobacco drying hut and went inside where a farmer explained tobacco farming and cigar making, and then rolled one for us! He dipped the mouth end in honey which he said was his families trademark and apparently acted as a natural filter. Then he lit it and showed us how to smoke it, I was surprised that it did actually taste pretty good (potentially due to the fresh honey it was dipped in?!).

Tobacco leaves drying inside the hut.

First Cigar.

We continued on our tour until we got to a small farm with a man working down in the field. When we looked up into the sky it was absolutely full of dragonflies, everywhere we looked, which our guide explained was because the farming was all organic in this area.

The black dots in th top right corner are all dragonflies.

We were told to pause for a water break so Josh and I sat down in the little hut on the field and were chatting away to each other when our guide rushed back to us and was like, c’mon guys lets go see the national park!! So we hurriedly followed him into some greenery where he pointed out that he had found a woodpecker and the national cuban bird. We also saw vultures and mockingbirds, and they really did copy Joshs whistle! Then the farmer from down in the field came up and joined us, and he and our guide sat down in the hut and chatted away over a cigar whilst Josh and I just sat there grinning away. They were drinking what they call ‘vitamin R’ which equates to neat rum!

Chilling with the local farmer.

Then we did a load more walking until we got to a bar (someones house with some benches outside, and a loo, thankfully!) where we were made pina coladas! Our guide said we can now say we have visited Cuba – we have danced salsa, smoked a cigar and drank rum! We walked back to the village where our guide left us. We thanked him and then needed some shade, rest, water and food! We popped into a local café and had a sandwich, bought ourselves a couple of internet cards just to stock up and then went back to our casa. I read my book in the sun on the terrace rocking chair whilst Josh edited some pictures, and our hosts made me a coffee. Then we strolled into town and ended up in an open air bar near the main plaza with Cuban singers and dancers, lined with locals and tourists who were already a few rums in (there were people asleep at their tables!) We went back to the casa, started to pack and had a nice big dinner cooked by our hosts. We settled our bill and went to bed.