Photography by Paul Dishman: Cruising Cuba

Just back from a great holiday in Cuba booked with the wonderful Holiday Place. 4th trip with them and they have never disappointed. This one was 4 nights in Havana followed by a great cruise around Cuba on the lovely Louis Cristal which offered us the chance to dock in Cuban ports and see places that might have been difficult to access via self drive given the lack of signposts / infrastructure.
This first post of the holiday features Havana - my undoubted favourite element of the trip. What can I say! People so friendly, no sense of threat anywhere, so many great old American cars, mojitos, music everywhere you go and all with a smile on their face. Customer service generally willing if unpolished. Ordinary people living in crumbling palaces. No litter. Great sense of pride / achievement and proud of the revolution. Tourism will change things but many hope slowly and do not want to lose the aspirations of the revolution. Fantastic seeing slogans / revolutionary images and propaganda extolling the virtues of literacy and revolution everywhere..
We did a slight upgrade to stay in the Telegrafo Hotel in downtown Havana right on the square. Such a good decision - sitting on the terrace watching the old cars and listening to the music was magical. Walking the backstreets with my camera I felt safe and able to chat freely with locals. Even managed to get myself gently scammed and share a mojito and rm fireater at 7.30 am one Sunday morning when the hotel internet was off (as usual) and I was left to explore the backstreets alone. Baseball coach Isa was happy to take me for the best mojito in town and tell me all about Castro, the revolution, the future, how proud he was of Cuban educationa dn health care (free for all) and it only cost me 15 cucs ( about £9 and way over the odds for a local Cuban bar but what the hell. Nearly 2 hours of musical / dance education tiued in with politics and local views - a bargain!). A few pics.