Professor Sharon

Well, are we there yet?  Nope. No. Indeed Not.  Today would turn out to be the longest day to travel the shortest distance in our travel adventures!

We left the Miami Courtyard at 6 a.m. — so you can figure out how early we had to get up.  We got to the airport to do a lot of waiting.  Lines for the visa, lines for security, lines for weighing your bag (and by the way you had to tell how much your body weighed as well) and I’m pretty sure there was a line for the line at some point.  We were supposed to leave Miami at 10 a.m., any guesses when we did leave?  Not at 10. It was changed to 1, then finally off the ground at 2 p.m.!

The flight was barely an hour-long – which for those of you who know me  this was a challenge in and of itself for my poor ears.  So while we were doing all the waiting, I kept calculating if I should take more decongestants.  I didn’t, and was pleasantly surprised to have my ears behave and with lots of help from chewing gum, swallowing water and yawning, I got them up and down again – yeah!

Cuba appears off in the distance!

Well, you know what came next – once we landed, more lines. We landed at the old section of the Havana airport as we were told that was where charters from the US were allowed.  Apparently there is a nice new building, but we never saw it.  Although I loved the walking down the steps from the airplane and across the tarmac — with lots of security in evidence, of course.

We have landed!

So after immigration and scanning in security lines, we were finally pushing, and I mean pushing our way through the crowds at the gate to the great outdoors of the building!  We were told by our American tour guide that in Cuba when there is a family member arriving by airplane, many family members are there to welcome them.  And, boy was it true.  I managed to get behind a woman who once out of the main gate was immediately surrounded by kissing and hugging relatives by the score — it was quite the feat to mush my way through the welcoming relatives!  But here we were at last!    And since, I was fairly talented at mushing, I got through quicker than others in the group.

All the locals waiting to welcome their loved ones!

A  young man, Luiz, our Cuban tour guide, who you will hear more about, was there to tell us the bus number and to make our way to it, as well as to enjoy the sites of the parking lot.

And a sight it was!  Old cars, low buildings, humid warm air and a sea breeze, palm trees, and an interesting sweet flower smell!  Wonderful!  After a bit of time, everyone made it through the last gauntlet, and onto the bus for the first time for several days.

The parking lot, and a few of the many incredible cars we would soon enjoy seeing.

Off we went with wonderful things to gawk at along the way – I certainly felt as though my history books had just come alive in front of me.  Luiz began to tell us much about what we were seeing and might enjoy later.  Unfortunately because we were so late in arriving, we would have to practice for the first, and most definitely not the last time, the key words of the week: patience and flexibility.  The bus ride was wonderful – out of the windows, a different world went by.  No billboards, no advertising, no car dealerships, no fast food joints, low buildings, lots of folks waiting at bus stops, children in uniforms making their way home from school, old cars and trucks, farm land, and a Viva Castro sign was our first peek at Cuba.

Out the bus window…

Across from the airport parking lot…

Passing by…

Our hotel was the Hotel Nacional, where believe it or not, we had some more waiting to do for room keys, luggage, and apparently, they had a pile of paperwork to do to allow us to stay.  They did give us the first of many many mojitos we would be drinking in the week ahead.  A room at last, with our luggage arriving soon after we let ourselves in (so glad for that as I was exhausted and really wanted a clean shirt and my toothbrush).  We washed up, exchanged money, and had a little walk around the outside of the hotel.

The hotel in the evening light.

At 7, we met for dinner at a restaurant in the back courtyard of the hotel for rice, beans, pulled beef, chicken, rolls and a very odd dessert — we just called it mushed mango as apparently there was some inability to directly translate the meaning of the dish to English – that’s what it was — mush a mango and pour it into a soup bowl.  And, more mojitos…always mojitos…and don’t forget the music….

The evening band….