Text and photos: Juan David Latorre.
You probably don’t know it, but Cuba is also a luxury tourist destination, accompanied by the warmth, friendliness and resilience of the Cuban people, a people and a country full of magic, that enchant. And the reason is easy to know: “Cuba is unique”.
And when writing one about this island, you wonder… where do I start to detail so much beauty, so much charm and so much Caribbean philosophy? How to sum up its form of existence (and resistance) away from the dominant model. Perhaps the best is to recreate in a first part in the capital, Havana. We will continue on another date with some of the charms of Cuba.
Founded in 1514 by the conquistador Pánfilo de Narváez under the founding name of “Villa de San Cristóbal de La Habana”, it was one of the first eight villas founded by the Spanish Crown on the island. Declared its old town World Heritage by UNESCO in 1982, its streets are full of history, cobblestones and classic cars, lost Cubans looking at the horizon and seeking their livelihood, convinced of a Revolution that some blindly support and others deny because they did not get what they wanted or because of fierce criticism of the established, as in all countries.
The greatest charm of Havana is walking through its streets. Its luxury holiday hotels, both in the historic area and in the municipalities of Playa and Miramar, and their commemorative squares of some historical fact or in homage to its main executor of independence, José Martí, or to Che Guevara or Camilo Cienfuegos, leaders of the Revolution, contrast with some half-demolished buildings waiting to be reformed and rebuilt by the Cuban authorities. Among this dramatic contrast stand out the colonial, Mudejar, neoclassical, Art Nouveau, Art Deco and eclectic buildings that abound in its historic center.
Wonderful and beautiful the building of the Gran Teatro de La Habana “Alicia Alonso”, the Bacardí building, the Embassy of Spain, etc. The Central Railway Station the University of Havana and the Capitol are examples of the nouveau style. The Capitol dome is 62 meters away and was the highest point in the city and an example of American influence at the time. Its Cathedral is in the Spanish baroque style and is dedicated to the patron saint of Cuba, the Virgen de la Caridad del Cobre, who is also known as “cachita”.
In terms of modern style, the Focsa Building and the Habana Riviera Hotel in the Vedado neighborhood, as well as the Habana Libre Hotel. And next to it, it is worth stopping at the beautiful Hotel Nacional, opened in 1930, which displays an eclectic architecture by mixing art deco, neocolonial, classical Roman and Spanish Moorish styles. The large and green garden, is an oasis within the city with typical Caribbean palm trees; it is a balcony towards Havana and its bay, to enjoy the incredible view of the calm blue sea and extasy with the sea breeze and delicious cocktails from the nearby bars.
At the beginning of the 1960s, the hotel housed a hundred peasant women from all regions of the country, summoned by the leadership of the Revolution to be literate and learn how to cut and sew.
Countless familiar faces from the world of celluloid, entertainment, politics, mafia, sports… have been guests of this hotel. A hotel standing in the middle of the 20th century, modernized in its facilities but with its corridors, elevators and ornaments that recall those times of… Good times and bad?
In the next report we will take a walk through several tourist and colonial towns such as Viñales, Trinidad or Varedero, a delight for tourists.
