Today we drove down to the island about an hour drive from Vinales and enjoyed a day of swimming and relaxing by the nice white sand beach. Not as beautiful as the places in Jibacoa and Trinidad, but still really nice. The problem with the place was the fact that we had to pay 5 CUC each just to drive into the island and the food options were limited and quite expensive, but we enjoyed it none the less.

Today was the day of horse riding, my first ever for that matter. When we met the guy who was going to be our guide he asked us if we have experience with horses and I responded that I don’t. Despite this no explanation of how to drive the thing was given. I kind of had to go with the flow. Luckily others had some experienced and explained to me how to stir the horse. Knowing my luck, my horse decided to be different as well it always wanted to be in front of everyone and didn’t have much respect for the route, taking me up some steep hills.

As it happens, the break we took was by the cigar merchants and of course we had to try some and to be shown how the cigars are made. After that was the unavoidable selling process, which finished with us, buying some cigars… what a surprise! ;)

After the break we continued through the breath-taking countryside of Vinales towards the caves. At the caves the guide met us and we followed him into the depths. At the end of a five minute walk with the torches, we reached an underground lake where we could swim. It seemed like us and our friends were the only people interested in swimming, so the guide accompanied the rest of the group out leaving us with one lentil for light only. :) Great experience!!!

After we returned from the eventful horse ride we took out time for chilling out next to the pool and enjoying a nice mojito in the sun. In the evening of that day we decided to check out the local culture club or casa de la musica and I finally had an opportunity to dance some salsa, as Alex wasn’t up for it, with first a very young cuban and afterwards with the one twice my age :) Both good dancers though.

Our last day in Trinidad was an early start as we only had an hour spare to have a last quick tour of Trinidad in the morning light. We then had to shoot back to the casa as the taxi would be arriving to pick us up. We managed to arrange a taxi yesterday that was shared with other tourists heading back to Havana. We agreed on the same price as the combined bus journey from Trinidad to Viñales over Havana. The taxi was not direct as promised, however there was another taxi waiting for us in Havana to take us to Viñales which was convenient.

The drive to Havana took about three hours and the journey to Viñales about two and a half hours. A bit longer than usual as it started raining heavily just as we were arriving in Havana. We had to change taxis in the pouring rain, which was fun. The as soon as we got on the motorway to Pinar Del Rio we encountered huge rivers of water crossing the motorway. I thought that we might not make it at some point as the Peugeot 106 we were in sounded like it was on its last legs. Then again, most cars in Cuba are that way. We made it through the rain and entered a spell of splendid weather.

We got to Viñales and went straight to the casa particular which was recommended in many guides. It was a really nice place with a pool, american pool table, bar and restaurant  We inquired and they could only accommodate us for one night, however they did recommend us to another casa she knew well around the corner and said that we could use their facilities too! We took the offer.

After finding a cheap peso pizza stand and munching while walking around, we bumped into a tourist we saw earlier on the street next to the Viñales stadium taking pictures with his huge sniper rifle camera of the sunset and kids playing on the grounds. I said “nice sunset, right?”. He replied and it turned out he was a British guy from Cambridge! We took a few pictures, said goodbye to the Brit and then headed back to casa nenita where the restaurant and pool was for an overdue beer.

When we got there we spoke to a guy who was working there called Joel. He was a really friendly guy who we spoke to about our travels in Cuba. We later started conversation with a really nice french couple who also arrived today. Their names were Corelin and Gregor. Together we had great conversation and a good drinking session with Joel nodding off on the table now and again.