Still in Havana

We have been in Havana in almost a week now, and we like it. We have explored the old city of Havana, museums, fortress and cuban life in general. The city is great, but has been even greater. Old beautiful buildings are likely to fall down and maintanance seems to be an unknown word. The state owns the buildings, and it does not have money to repair anything.



The cuban people are very nice, but have for sure realized that tourists have alot of money, when you walk the streets, you are seldom left alone, everybody wants to do you favours, sell you cigars, invite you to dinner og ask you for money. Not strange actually, normal salary here on Cuba is only about 15 dollars a month. People don´t have much, but seem very happy even tough. People speak mostly spanish, so we have to practice our spanish skills, that are not much to write home about. Cubans are now learning english at school, but not many years ago, they learnt russian instead!

If anybody should wonder, nobody use american dollars here anymore. It is prohibited and now tourists have to use pesos convertible. The value is about the same as dollar, and with pesos convertible you can get almost everything, but only almost. You can even buy Coca Cola in the "dollar-stores". Cubans usually earn "moneda national", which are also called pesos, but you have to pay about 25 of those to get one pesos convertible. With this money you cannot buy much, but street food is often in moneda national, and then you can get a meal for almost nothing.



The norwegian boat "Agape" is here, we haven´t seen them since Tobago Keys, and it was very nice to meet them again. They have been sailing another route than us, via Venezuela and Colombia. They have the boat in the Marina Hemmingway here in Havana. They had visit from their son and a friend, and together with some other norwegians they had met here, one night we were not less than 12 norwegians for dinner!

We haven´t seen Fidel yet, but even then we feel he is everywhere. In the newspapers, on posters, in the museums, in the souvernir shops and in the book stores. He has a great impact on the people and the country, but he is now 79 years old, and he cannot live forever, so the coming years will be excitening for the cuban people. What is happening after Fidel?

Hans Olav, Sandra and Arild will leave for Vinales tomorrow, but David will stay in Havana. After some days there, we will meet again in Havana, and then go back to the boat. We plan to leave Cuba on Sunday the 30th or Monday the 1st, that is in about one week. The next stop is Bermuda and then the Azores in the beginning of June. We plan to be back in Norway the 15th of July, if anybody wonder about that. But not yet, before that, alot more to see.