The Route
There was no grand plan to this trip, we had one week to do it, we didn't want to kill ourselves doing silly distances in a humid tropical climate, and we knew the Vinales region was a great destination to aim for in the time we had. Also, we knew we had to start and finish in Havana because that's where the airport is - end of plan! The map below gives a rough idea of the route, it zigzags somewhat because we got lost more than once! This was not entirely due to navigational incompetence however, Cuban road signs do leave something to be desired, in fact half the time they don't exist. But the roads are great when you are out of Havana, incredibly quiet and generally in reasonable condition.
In total we probably did about 200 miles, starting out from Havana we cycled West along the northern coast towards a town called Mariel, which is dominated by a huge cement factory, not the most scenic of places. We stayed near a place called Las Terrazas on the first night, after cycling for over 2 hours through a tropical rainstorm, not as unpleasant as you might imagine, in fact quite welcome after a day of cycling in baking heat and dust. Next day was an easy one, 20 or 30 km to Soroa up in the hills, a beautiful area. The third day was a long one to Pinar Del Rio to the west along the motorway, probably approaching 100km in baking heat. Yes - you can cycle on the motorway, well, nobody stopped us and the police seemed friendly enough. After about 7 hours on the bikes we arrived at Pinar Del Rio, some extraordinary architecture but it looked very run down. It's a working city, apparently the centre of the tobacco trade. But we wanted to go to the Vinales, 30km north, so we cheated and got a taxi to take us there (Look, I could have lied, right?). Vinales was like another planet after Pinar, relaxed and very beautiful. Nobody hassles you in Vinales village, it's such a great place we stayed there for a full three days, cycling around the valley, drinking Bucanero and Cuba Libre's etc. After three days it was time to head back to Havana, and reluctantly we caught the bus back. You serious cyclists might mock this but we made a big mistake on this trip, we hired bikes rather than taking our own. We were assured they were good quality hybrids but in fact they were worn out old Raliegh mountain bikes fitted with worn out road tyres! We had numerous punctures along the way and the brakes started playing up in the more moutainous regions. So if you plan anything similar do take your own bike, it's a hassle on the plane but it's worth it. At this point it's worth giving a little bit of praise to Virgin Atlantic, we had superb flights from Gatwick right into Havana, good value, great service and very comfortable.
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