Sorry, that list is too long! I’ll write it down in an “about me v2.0″ section at some point in time but not now. (Yes, there are some background developments going on with regards to this website, so stay tuned!)

So, back to business. From city to city, bus to truck and the hills to the coast; time to complete the loop! After Bayamo (sshhh, be quiet!) it was time for some more coastal work; off to Trinidad! FInding a place to stay is easy as there are about 1200 rooms for rent and 400 tourists scattered throughout the city… so you’re pretty much being nailed to the wall by casa owners desperately trying to rent their place to you - lol! Having to deal with such a thing a 6am is all the more fun! Other than that, this has definately been the nicest city I’ve been to in all of Cuba, though I know a lot of people will argue this :) Trinidad forms a nice mix of Caribbean and Latino/Cuban culture, along with beautiful surroundings in the inland as well as a pretty beach. Quite the place to crash down for a couple days and get drunk so that’s what I did! The days merely consisted of city-viewing, beach-bumming, exchanging stories (and laughing my butt off) and dancing! Great to be there so go watch pictures like you always do!

Next up; a final visit to Habana! Since I knew I’d be passing through here a couple more times I decided not to visit all parts in one go so here’s part 3! You know, buildings, old cars and stuff… so on to Vinales; tobacco country, backed by limestone rocks and a lot less linear than the rest of Cuba - or so it seemed at first sight :) I got there together with this guy (you’re welcome Trav!) and went on cave visits, biking trips and some longer hikes, in the middle of the day while it was 33C (what were we thinking again!?). Visiting local tobacco farmers, discovering (well, sort of) a cave nobody told us about and going on bike trips is fun after a lot of city-flavour!

After Vinales it was time to crash down in Las Terrazas, a Soviet-style model eco-village (try to say that 10 times in a row), pretty much out of the way of most places. Pretty fit to chill out for a while and explore a little more nature, after all I now realise I like being near nature more than being in big cities :) Part of the fun was staying in a bird’s nest-style house but I forgot to take a picture, sorry!

Then, the final stop: Habana, getting ready for the return leg to Guatemala. This basically meant I re-re-re-reconfirmed my flight for the 5th time - although it was fun I didn’t want to go through this hassle again - and found the time to help Travis out trying to file a report for his stolen camera… NOT!!! A couple hours, three different police stations and A LOT of talking later, we were simply being told this: “Your story about this theft is strange, so how about we start investigating your story and hold you in custody until we sort this out?”. Ehmmmm… (sweat, tremble, gnawing for breath) … not quite what we need only 4 hours before our flight’s departure. Anyway, we eventually managed to get the hell out of the police station and subsequently the country :) Socialism, at some point it just gets to you… bye bye Cuba!

The next article will be posted on Wednesday night so stay tuned and come back soon!! Hasta luego!!

-René

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A church! After all it's been a while!

Trinidad's street "life"

Trinidad - unique rooftops and hills ;)

… in Cuba! Exactly - it’s been almost 3 years months since the last time I wrote something down here so it’s high time to finish what I started, don’t you agree? I am writing to you from the aftermath of a 10-month trip but in view of lovely memories it’s all the more pleasant to write about stuff that happened. And A LOT happened down there in Cuba, so let’s get started…

Right here I mentioned my ability to run into the most random situations and this has been overly confirmed during the month I spent in Cuba. I’m talking ancient times, 18 April 2009 A.D….

How to get to Cuba - It’s so simple. I should’ve known. Cuba, Cubana Airlines and e-tickets, it just doesn’t add up. But yet I somehow did assume all would be fine. My flight was bound to leave around 9.30am and somehow I still hadn’t seen anyone from Cubana Air by 8.30. Luckily I bumped into another few people who were bound to be on the same flight, so at least I got some assurance I wasn’t completely wrong. We managed to get in touch with some guy from the airline by phone, who subsequently came to the airport by bike. Easy to recognise him as he

was the only one riding around the main terminal on a bicycle! A short conversation resulted in the following explanation: “As there’s only four of you, we decided not to operate this flight, sorry!” … ehhh, so what do we do now? “Three of you can be rebooked on a flight to Cuba through Panama City”. Right, you feel it coming… “…with the exception of Mr Miltenburg, as he was informed of this situation previously”. WTF!? I asked him when and how as despite many hangovers, I never noticed anything; “I’ll call the office, hang on…” (he calls and reverts back to me) “They sent you an e-mail half an hour ago”. One thing in life I’m strictly convinced of is the fact fighting is for losers, so a simple look from my end seemed to change things: “I’ll have you booked along with the other three on the flight through Panama”. Viva Cubana - here we go!

Alright, so apart from a little intercambio de equipaje (don’t feel like explaining, sorry) we landed in Habana around 1am. Hurray! Next up: getting through customs. This should be simple and straightforward and for tourists it obviously is, however one Cuban guy on our flight didn’t seem to get through. The reason: despite his double nationality he couldn’t take any luxury goods into the country, unless he paid some serious $$$ tax. Being the angel I am (LOL), I decided to be of a little help by saying his bag with luxury goods was mine. The response from customs was simple: “It’s not” . My statement “Wanna prove it’s not?” seemed to be enough to let us through… after which the bag magically disappeared in the arrivals hall, despite my newly-made Cuban friend staying with me. So yes, I smuggled. And although I’m not proud of it, it’s still funny :)

My reward consisted of a free night of sleep; I was taken to the guy’s (Osmar is his name) parents and got to stay in a small Cuban apartment, after a nightly walk through Habana, which is quite the experience in itself! A combination of decaying colonial grandeur, Cubans hanging out and drunk tourists… it’s all in the mix! Down at the apartment I was amazed by the way things looked - it’s nowhere near poverty but it’s the fact the newest piece of equipment in the room dated back to 1975… check the pics to get an idea!

The next day consisted of a short walk through Habana and a take-off to Varadero. Yes - that’s the place full of tourists, outrageously priced hotels and so forth… a place I would definately skip if it wasn’t for a friend staying there! Getting there is half the fun (again!) since there don’t seem to be any buses on Sunday (!?) and the only means of transport - though illegal - is by a 1950s Chevrolet taxi. Yaay!! Huffing, puffing, coughing and bumping (I mean the taxi, not me!) we got to Varadero. While searching for my friend I initially wasn’t let into the resort. The reason: looks and way of dressing in general - welcome to Varadero, though I can’t state they were entirely wrong ;)

Varadero officially has no underground scene (illegal taxis, houses for rent, restaurants, etc) so it took a whole 10 minutes to arrange all of that, which for Cuban measures is a record (in terms of slowness, not speediness). Hurray and respect for my casita - I was right on the beach, in the non-touristy area! The best game to play on the beach was “Find the white guy” (really hard!) and at the same time my friend arranged a resort-wristband for me so I could make use of some 5-star facilities down the road as well. Sweet!

After a little bit of beach (just can’t get enough…) it was time to hit Habana again, in bright daylight this time! What can I say - blabla colonial stuff, old buildings, culture, cigars, old cars (yay!) etcetcetc… you probably heard most of it before so enjoy the series of pictures below!

Next up (Wednesday, that is): How to travel east and meeting a bunch of MacGyvers! Stay tuned!

-René

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Standard decoration, present in every house!

"I'm a Cuban, please take a picture of me!" ... Sure! :)

My first hotel room (Habana)

Just like I said: hello! As some of you might know, Internet in Cuba is just like internet back home… in 1973! So there’s the reason for not posting anything lately, though of course there’s plenty of things to tell! I’ll be back in Guatemala on the 16th, so by then new articles should start pouring out here :) Oh, here’s something I could mention already: My ETA in Amsterdam is… 31 May at 2pm, just in case you felt like showing up / sending death threats / generally annoy me / etc!

Thanks for your patience (or annoyment!) and come back soon!

Regards from Trinidad,

René

Yeah, I know, I`m sorry… its been way too quiet out here in the last couple weeks but it`s just that I seriously geared up on traveling speed and as such don`t have too much time to write stuff down here. Anyway…

“Rene Miltenburg! Stop complaining about the fact you cannot dance… either DO something about it or just shut up!”

This is what I (sort of) told myself on a minivan trip between San Cristobal and country #8 on this trip: Guatemala! My first destination: Xela - aka Quetzaltenango - located in the country`s western highlands! Yes… more C, culture and cold! However, before arriving there I had to cross yet another border. This is the 13th time this trip (believe it or not!) … and the third time I got into trouble. I guess I`m not doing too well, statistically speaking… Anyway, the conversation between me and the migracion guy about having or not having paid tourist tax was interesting. Click “read more” for a short transcript! :)

Whatever, fast forward; Xela isn`t quite the place you just hang out at - people come here to accomplish something, be it learning Spanish, doing some serious hiking, learning Mayan languages, or … learn salsa dancing! In my case, mainly the latter applied though inbetween I also ascended Volcan Tajumulco - this highest peak in Central America. After all, you can`t really say you topped Central America if you haven`t been to the highest point, can you? :) Pictures once again are worth more than words, so have fun viewing! The erupting volcano you see is Santiaguito; one of the most active volcanoes in the region so no, we`re not talking coincidence (or bad karma) here! In order to chill down, we also visited some hot springs (H-O-T!) and - for a change - the cheesiest church on the western hemisphere (where´s the competition? ;))!

As for the dancing - again, believe it or not - I did actually book some serious progress! “Unfortunately” I couldn`t take any pictures :) but for those interested I`ll be happy to give some demo`s once back home! Yes, you heard that right, home… where`s that again!? I`ll come bck to you on that topic soon - stay tuned!

-René  “this is a friggin` bootcamp!” Miltenburg

PS: In light of respect for local indigenous cultures I cannot publish any detailed pictures of the people and / or elements of their daily lives. Taking pictures without any explicit consent is believed to steal spirits and is as such not appreciated - let alone these pictures being published. Thanks for understanding.

PPS: The pictures of the Tajumulco hike will be included tomorrow(-ish)!

Update 19-Mar: Done!

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Xela - "any given Sunday"

Indigenous market we bumped into - nice ´n busy!

Xela´s surroundings - Volcan Santamaria (amongst others)

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OK, short one this time - no too much text, lots of photos… just the way you like it right? :)

It´s been a while already, thus high time to update this site! So after leaving Merida (and with that, Carnaval and the heat) I got to San Cristobal de las Casas. (Yet another) colonial town, but with the difference that it´s in the middle of an area where indigenous cultures and traditions are strongly mixed into daily life! Besides it´s in the mountains (at 2100m altitude, so it´s C-O-L-D at night!), which means there´s lots of opportunities to be hyperacctive for a bit, which was just what I needed!

So here´s a little rundown; after getting off the nightbus (= 1 hour of sleep thanks to snoring Mexicans) I decided to go on a litle hike, just for the heck of it. It was fun though :) The next days consisted of cruising around town, visiting indigenous communities (San Juan Chamula, amongst others), finally (!!) going to a cave and … sigh … visiting a waterfall, which was really massive by the way! As for the Disneyland-factor (after all I was on a popular tourist trail, bumping into the same people over and over again :)), I visited Cañon del Sumidero; a nice-looking canyon but a huge tourist-trap (though a cheap one ;)). In light of being realistic (as I always am!!), see below for a picture of what was to be found “around the corner” once we went in.

Anyway, no complaints; it´s been great out there! Right now I went on to Xela (aka Quetzaltenango, Guatemala) - yet another good spot to be hyperactive so expect another article soon!

Take care!

Rene “where´s my backpack again” Miltenburg

Update 09-Mar: Cosmetics are done!

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San Cristobal´s main cathedral

Wanna see a church? WORK FOR IT!

... and this is the reward ...

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Preliminary notice: female visitors should stay away from reading this post!

Just kidding! As I said before I was going to take a couple days to enjoy a deeper splurge into “culture” - no better way of doing it than this way I guess!? Anyway, place of action: Merida. Theme: movies. Temperature: 30C (35C around parades). Atmosphere: relaxed though intense. People: diverse, really nice and fun-loving. Music: all sorts. Personal level of energy: normal (= severely hyperactive). Dancing abilities: bad as ever. Stamina: getting worse by the day… Summarising: All systems go!

The reason I have once again backtracked was because Merida was “most accessible and diverse for a celebration such as this one” - Muhaha! Besides I needed my kick of non-logic since things had been going straight for too long now ;) So basically there`s not a lot to this carnaval that you don`t know from TV yet; parades are colourful and all about the demonstrations, there`s stages throughout the entire city center hosting bands, DJs and whatnot playing all kinds of music. Add about 200.000 visitors (daily average) to this scene and it all evolves into one big, cool party. Viva carnaval!

Since carnaval is all about the demonstration I guess the pictures below should tell the story, so have fun viewing them while I am going to spend 14 hours on a bus heading off to San Cristobal de las Casas, up in the mountains. Yes -it`s time to get cold again (why am I doing this to myself!?) and do some hiking, climbing and whatever else can be done up there! Till soon!

-Rene

PS: Before heading back to Merida I visited two nice waterfalls too - so pics of those have been added as a little appendix :)

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First arrival - still fresh despite the temperature!

Not sure which team they were supporting

This stuff is heavy...

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