photos of weekend trip to Matanzas

view of la habana from casablanca

view of la habana from casablanca

the inside of the whack 50+ year old train, looks even whacker in real life i promise

the train kept on stopping so people could climb onto the roof

finally got to matanzas

a bridge into matanzas

how cubans dress

my friend's back. walking to the hitch-hiking spot, we are both tired.

Matanzas

This past weekend I took my first independent trip (the trip to Viñales was part of our orientation week schedule) away from La Habana. Saturday morning (Halloween), at about 7am, a friend and I left the house with two backpacks, two rolls of bread, 15 peanut bars, and a Lonely Planet CUBA guidebook. The only thing we knew about our trip was our destination: Matanzas.

We took a guagua to a pier in Habana Vieja, and by great fortune (or my friend’s good sense of direction/mad map reading skills) found without trouble the ferry to Casablanca, the part of Havana right across the bay from Habana Vieja, where we were planning to catch the 8:30 “Hershey Train” to Matanzas. When we got to the train station, the lady informed us with a laugh and wave of the hand that the 8:30 train hadn’t been running for years, and that the next train out was due to leave at 12:30pm. We felt a little cranky about this, because we had gotten up early and missed our free breakfast at the residence, but decided to wait it out and hang out in Casablanca, which, luckily, seemed rather quaint and un-Havana like, and also contained a giant Christ statue.

We started to look for coffee, because we were sleepy. Casablanca, being un-Havana-like, however, was not llenita de cafeterias, however, we walked past some people’s houses and saw a woman at the door/window of one and asked her if she had coffee. She gave us two expresso-sized shots, and waved us away when we offered to pay. We walked around, looking at the cute little place—it was somewhat rural feeling, because of the almost complete lack of commercial stuffs, the atmosphere of the people and houses made me think of grandma’s village in the mountains—and trying to find more coffee. I don’t remember how, but we ran into this old man, who semi-adopted us and took us around the town, first to a woman who he thought was his daughter (she was a family friend, he was slightly demented—“silly old man,” she said, grabbing onto his shoulders, “he thinks I’m his daughter—“she looks at me, “but I’m not!”), who gave us two delicious cups of coffee, and then to meet his “mujer.” This was nice, even though, being an old man, he walked at an extremely slow pace, because we got to see part of the town which we probably would not have thought to see ourselves, and also because the little visita we had in the woman who was not his daughter’s house was pleasant and interesting. There was a girl there from the neighboring province who was in Havana to see a doctor, and also in love with the old man’s grandson, but unfortunately he did not love her back. At one point, the grandson came in too, with a dog, and then there were 6 of us and a dog in her tiny and colorful living room, filling up all the space: a Chinese girl (me), my blue-eyed friend, this woman in her nightgown, the young woman who loved the grandson, the grandson, the grandfather, and a dog—and it was all very funny because there was a bright tacky picture of fruit on the wall, and everyone was gossiping about each other in front of each other.

“That’s the one,” the girl said to me loudly, gesturing towards the grandson and looking at him, “I love him but he doesn’t want me.”

“Why not?” I asked.

“He’s scared,” the woman who wasn’t the daughter said, waving her arms around. The grandson looked a little embarrassed and then said some things and left.

Anyways, after we said goodbye to the old man, we went to find Jesus, the giant white statue of Christ hovering over the little hill neighborhood. We got to the top and there was a beautiful view of Havana, which made it look like a sprawling metropolis, which it does not feel like from the inside. Then we went to the Che museum, which was boring and useless, got some pizzas, played on a communist playground, and then went to catch our train. The train. The train was about three cars long, looked like it was over 50 years old (which it was), and had the most uncomfortable seats in the world. It went very very slow and rocky, and kept on stopping to pick up people and because was broken and needed to be fixed. It only cost 1.40 pesos, however, which amounts to about 7 cents. The train ride took about 4 hours, so with the 4 hours we had to wait to get on it, it took us about 8 hours to get to Matanzas.

Matanzas itself was pretty boring. It was cleaner and neater than Habana, and less commercial as well. All in all, it felt like a Miami suburb, although I’ve never really been in a Miami suburb.

Here is what we did:

Walked around the city.

Tried to find food. I ate a lot of hot dogs and pizza and peanut bars. My friend ate less than me, even though he was a man, and I felt like a fatty.

Saw las Cuevas de Bellamar, which was kind of tourist trappy. But caves are pretty cool, and we got a bucket of chocolate ice cream and climbed this crazy tree and sat in it and ate the ice cream, and all the kids on the ground thought we were pretty cool, so I guess it was okay.

Went swimming in a dirty dirty beach. Got a big bruise because my friend threw a fallen palm branch at my leg (accidentally of course). We tied our things to the palm branch so that people wouldn’t steal them while we were swimming.

Tried to hitch hike back to Havana. However, Matanzas is very un-Cuba-y, which was further proven by the impossibility of hitch hiking from Matanzas. At both the hitch-hiking stops, there were at least 20 people standing around, waving money in the air, but no one stopped. One man we talked to had been waiting since 3 in the afternoon, and it was 6. We got tired and decided to pull a touristy rich American move and took a taxi to the bus station, where we got a maquina back to La Habana for $15, which seems cheap but was about 300 times as much as the train ride. The ride took less than two hours, so I guess it was 4 times shorter, and a little more comfortable. Therefore, with all factors included it was probably only about 50 times more expensive than the train ride, which I guess is worth it if you’re tired and lazy and have money in your pocket. Amazing what a little bit of money can do in this country.

Conclusion: a nice trip, enjoy the photos.