Cuatro Dias en Vinales

We spent four days in Valle de Vinales. The valley is surrounded by mountains that have limestone cliffs climbing each side, and are covered with a huge variety of trees. A very recognizable feature of these mountains are the mogotes, steep limestone outcrops. There are fields dedicated to farming tobacco, pineapples, and many other fantastic crops. Tons of chickens and dogs roam about the streets and fields.

The farms

Vinales is west of Havana, about a 3-hour bus ride. We left Havana for Vinales on Monday, arriving late in the afternoon. Right when we got off of the bus, there were people asking us if we needed a place to stay. We actually already had a place to stay, but had a hard time finding it since every single house is available for rent because tourism is the industry in Vinales. Once we got settled in our nice little casa particulares we went out to the main plaza to use wifi for homework, and went out to a very pleasant dinner. We noticed that in Vinales the wifi worked much better than in Havana. Another thing we noticed was that when you cross the street, people stop for you, but in Havana it seemed like people wanted to kill you because you were crossing the street. Vinales was also much cleaner than Havana, there weren't piles of trash and dog shit in the street. We think that since Vinales gets so many tourists, there is a lot more effort put into making it a pleasant place to be. I got a suprema grille, very good grilled chicken, my brother got a tortilla (which is an omelette), and my parents both got filete de pescado. I have to say it felt good to get out of Havana. 

Church in the main plaza

The next day we woke up and Ismary, the woman renting us the place, made a very good breakfast, where I discovered that I like papaya. She had made jugo naturales de papaya and also served fresh papaya. After breakfast, we rented bikes for the day. They didn't really work very well, but it was still fun to bike around the valley. We rode out to Mural de la Prehistoria, a mural painted on a cliff face, depicting human evolution. The giant painting was first designed by Leovigildo Gonzalez Morillo in 1961. He was a follower of Diego Rivera. It was painted on the cliff by 18 people, and it took them 4 years. 

Our breakfast

Nuestra desayuno

Mural de la Prehistoria

On our third day in Vinales, we took a bus to Cayo Jutia, a secluded beach (although full of day trippers) with delicious batidos de frutas. I got a bit of a sunburn because I'm a wee bit pale, or should I say red now. The beach is about an hour and a half drive from Vinales along an unpleasant, pot hole filled road. Once you get there you forgive the drive, because the beach is very nice. We walked over to some mangroves to get changed and set up "camp," but got attacked by tons of mosquitoes, so my brother and I changed as fast as possible and ran into the refreshing, beautiful, clear water. Lesson learned, steer clear from the trees that surround the beach. When we got out, we sat down on the beach chairs we had rented and sipped a delicious pina colada sin rum. Once we finished the pina coladas and lunch, I took a nap then went back into the water. When it was getting close to four, the time our bus driver would be meeting us, we got out of the water and got ready to go. After walking over to the parking lot, I went into the mangroves again, for certain reasons, and came out with my arms covered in mosquito bites. I had forgotten about the risk of journeying into the trees. We had another unpleasant drive home, but felt satisfied with the day when we were able to access our anti itch cream.

The mangroves with mosquitoes

Running into the water

Our sweet ride

On our fourth and final day, we rented bikes again, then went on a long bike ride on a pretty road through a different part of the valley. On the way back, we stopped at a small juice stand on the side of the road, my dad and I both got mango juice and my brother and mom got pineapple juice. After our short stop we rode home, stopping to buy very overpriced water. For lunch we went to an Agroecologica Restaurante where they grow their own produce in gardens surrounding the restaurant. We had arroz morro (a traditional rice and bean dish), yucca, fresh vegetables and chicken. We all ate way to much, not wanting to waste the delicious food. Later in the evening, we went on an another bike ride on a short loop through some farm land, we ran into a very small puppy that we coulddn't help but stop to pet, and several horses. We had the same bad bikes from the day before, but I found a little side path that was fun to ride on. Since we had such a big lunch, we thought it would be best if we didn't have a big dinner, but we coulnd't resist trying a Mediterranean restaurant that our guide book recommended and ended up getting a ton of food any way. It's funny, there is no food in the grocery stores, but if you go out to eat you get way too much. Feeling like we were about to explode, we went home and tried to go to sleep early (although it was still past 10:00 when we finished dinner), since we had a bus ride at 6:45 next the morning to Trinidad.

Our bike ride