Sailing with the Treleavens

Geoff and Pip Lavis from Sydney, have now joined us for the 350nm sail west along the south coast of Cuba to Cienfuegos, passing the very high Sierra Maestra Mountains and on through the many cays of the Archipielago de los Jardines de la Reina (Royal Gardens).

Provisioning has been an interesting exercise. Eggs are allocated at 10 per person per month; we manage to acquire someone’s quota and also acquire more on the black market. We don’t feel guilty about this; they are all eager to get some tourist dollars (CUC). A taxi driver buys for us the bread but of course there is no choice with just one style of loaf available. Cakes we wouldn’t even consider buying; again just one style of sponge coated with mock cream. Fruit and vegetables are limited to what’s seasonal but no problem to buy and very cheap.

The two currencies are confusing and it’s creating a class difference not only for the tourist but also for the locals. Only those that have managed to acquire CUC’s may enter the Dollar shops ( the national peso is used by locals). A lot of educated people have now turned to the tourist industry, as it is their way of getting the more valuable currency.

We enjoyed our two week stay at the marina with very nice staff and more services than we expected. Cruisers come and go… some to Jamaica others to the Dominican Republic or heading west like us. Our only problem was acid rain leaving small yellow spots on the deck from a refinery near by.

We continued our sightseeing and particularly enjoyed visiting Moncada Barracks, the sight of Fidel Castro’s first failed attack against the ruling corrupt Batista government on the 26th July 1953. The bullet holes are still present on the outside of the building while inside the history of the up rising is shown in detail. Castro was finally successful on the 1st January 1959.

The local cemetery, Santa Ifigenia, is full of history especially to the martyrs of all the many uprisings over the centuries. Every half hour there is a changing of the goose stepping-guards for the tomb of Josef Marti (1853-95), the most revered of all. The Bacardi Rum family are also here plus the original Buena Vista Social Club band member Comay Segundo.

There’s not a lot of wind under the protection of the mountain range for our departure but it’s a perfect day for fishing, whales and dolphins. The mountain is 1200 metres high and the sea below is 7000 metres deep; a record height in the world for such a short distance. Many barracuda are thrown back but we keep the four tuna, hooking two at a time on separate lines.

Pilon is a night stop and next day onto Cabo Cruz, anchoring behind a breaking reef with lighthouse at the most southern part of Cuba. This is superb swimming bay with a beautiful sunset while fisherman row out to get lobster. We have never felt more secure.

Next morning, as we reach for our beach towels, we find them missing. Also gone are Ian’s old but treasured Sperry sandals. For the first time in our seven years of cruising we have that horrible feeling of someone being on board while we slept. We don’t report it as what is taken is only petty theft and there were more valuable things around like our fishing rod etc but it still leaves an uneasy feeling. In a country that we have felt safer in than anywhere else it is quite a surprise but definitely an isolated experience.

Even with no change to this glorious no sailing weather, the boys hoist the spinnaker but it’s mostly motoring. We don’t really mind, as it’s really very relaxing. The Royal Gardens are a chain of hundreds of small-uninhabited cays with white sand and covered in mangroves. The only people out here are the fisherman and us. For the next nine days we day hop to different cays, entering shallow bays surrounded by coral and see only three other yachts.

What we have really come for is the culinary delight of the sea and it doesn’t disappoint us. A fishing station is approached by Geoff and Ian in the dinghy inside a mangrove inlet. Old rusty ferro cement fishing boats (some floating and others washed ashore), lobster cages piled high and men working out here for days on end. At first they don’t have anything but its magic as Ian pulls out a bottle of rum. Suddenly seven big lobsters appear and Ian finds three cans of coke for ten smiling men.

BBQ lobster served with garlic butter for dinner and wondering if we will get any more. Our next anchorage, Cayo Anclitas, is the perfect horseshoe bay with one other yacht. It doesn’t get anymore natural than this ashore; live conch shell line the waters edge and strange trail marks leave the water and disappear into the bushes. Analysing that they look like bike tracks or maybe the roll of an anchor chain, we ignore and explore. Bugs send us back to the yacht after a stroll in the evening heat and picking up shells.

Not long after we get back to the yacht we have a visit by fishermen and we request ten lobster for two bottles of rum (at only USD4.12 a bottle). With smiling faces they set off to find them. In the meantime the other cruising boat comes over and asks if we saw the crocodiles on the beach….. instantly there are four very stunned, very still people with mouths open on the deck of Finisterre.

After half an hour the fisherman returned with 23 lobsters! Lobster omelette for breakfast, lobster salad with Thousand Island dressing for lunch and lobster green curry for dinner. In fact out of eight consecutive meals seven included lobster. We have now gone from healthy hearts to high cholesterol.

We sail onto where the prawn fishing fleet are based in Cayo Cuervo. Once again the big ships are approached and the heads are shaking no until the rum comes out. Ian is asked onboard and points to the prawns. Six kilos of prawns later, we have five meals of crustaceans and finally, a very welcome pork chop. Rum has been our best friend to date.

Every cay and anchorage we visited has been superb and all recommended by Jesus the local skipper of the charter catamaran we met in Santiago. On arriving at Cayos Machos de Fuera we find a cay that’s a natural habitat for endangered mammals. Ashore a caretaker takes us on an amazing circumnavigation of the island, in and out of mangroves, sighting birds, iguanas and jutia (tree rats the size of cats) all living with no fear of humans. Fortunately there are no crocodiles. A lot of animals became endangered, especially the tree rat, as they were eaten by Cubans when food was scarce during Castro’s special period of austerity after the full of the Soviet Union in 1991.

After nine days of near isolation at sea, we look forward to returning to civilisation. With a 55nm sail on to the classic city of Cienfuegos we awake to a 20 knot North easterly for a perfect sail along the mountainous coast. Entering another narrow entrance we sail across the big enclosed bay to the marina. Very interesting architecture awaits us.

Our first 24 hours in Cuba, Ian feels like he has died and gone to heaven with wonderful music, mojitos and friendly Spanish speaking people. As for me, it is an enlightening experience, full of wonderful wide eyed images.

Our sail to the eastern tip of Cuba from the Turks was fast and furious. Once in the lee of the island on the south side we sailed 100nms west to Santiago de Cuba. Half way along we are confronted by the might of the USA Military in the form of a patrol boat armed with machine guns and canon pointing directly at us. We are passing Guantanamo Bay, the United States Naval Base, and we wished to take a closer look but we are immediately informed by VHF radio that we are close to USA Territory (thoughts go to Rudd and Obama currently meeting; aren’t we on the same side?) and to identify ourselves. It actually took the operator six times to obtain all the information.

The ocean boundary is 3nms offshore and extends along the shore for over 8nms. The patrol boat was flanked between us and the shore for over an hour. It was a bit nerve racking watching the 20 year gunner with his finger on the tricker hoping he wouldn’t slip on a big wave by mistake. Undeterred we sail on to a very different port of entry… Santiago de Cuba. We are greeted by the historical Castillo de San Pedro Del Morro fort on the steep headland built by the Spanish in 1633 and a history lesson begins.

Our Cruising Guide has not been revised for ten years and we where expecting a filthy harbour, rickety wharf, officials wanting gifts and if you are lucky some other cruisers for company. This was not the case. From the moment we entered the fiord looking harbour, it opens up and with that wow factor! The water is clean, a stunning back drop of mountains, locals at the beach, palm trees everywhere and the marina is full with ten cruising yachts. What you do also notice is the lack of paint and maintenance everywhere like time has stood still for 50+ years although the beauty of the place and the delightful friendly people make up for it.

Once we passed the pleasant officials (lost count of the number) including a Doctor to make sure we have no diseases and a sniffer dog, we join a spontaneous 50th birthday party ashore for a pig on the spit and a whole new set of friends. Irish Nick on “Val” is single handing his way around the world and wants us to join him early the next morning to visit the farmers market in the centre of the city ten kilometres away. The main square, Parque Cespedes is just as we expected; Spanish architecture with some crumbling and some being restored, old colourful classic 1950’s American cars and an old woman smoking a cigar.

The first problem to cope with is the confusing double currency. Convertible pesos for tourists and for locals, national pesos but to buy at the local markets we need both. The farmers market is rustic and very very cheap. Farmers have only just recently been able to sell on the open market and although limited, it’s seasonal and very fresh. Meat is pork, pork and pork which is going to test my creative skills but at least we will end up with healthy hearts.

Coffee is at the Casa Grand Hotel overlooking the square in 20’s style with open veranda and art décor lights. Salsa music fills the air everywhere you go. Old men on benches strum guitars. Africans sing and dance to their own tune. Small café/bar theatres have day time free shows where locals do there own thing. One such place is Casa de la Trova where we spend many hours listening and having lunch in the Spanish open air style courtyard. This is the home of Cuban music and many famous bands have emerged from here including The Buenos Vista Social Club whose 70+ year old performers have toured the world. We had not realised it but Cuba is home to mojitos and we enjoy many. Their idea of rum and coke is a bottle of each for $5.

This is great, we need to freshen up back at the yacht and be back in town for the evening session. Our ride back is in a sky blue 1948 Buick; so much fun as the petrol engine roars into life. I can barely see out the window as I sink into old sky blue leather. Romantic salsa music fills the car… I’m in the movie ‘Grease’… the colourful, cute driver who loves his car will be back to pick us up.

Colourful ladies of the night, passionate salsa dancing, hustlers teaching the girls how it is done and long mojitos as the bands do their thing on stage; this night should never end. At 2pm there are not a lot of cars around, so we take our life in our own hands and get a 1970’s Russian Lada which is a beat up heap, coasting down hills to save fuel and on arrival looses its exhaust pipe.

Our next two days are spent at the marina just loving the weather and mucking about.
We have no choice but to be moored here as rules state we are not allowed to anchor out and we cannot use the dinghy to explore. But we do however have power, water and Havana Club rum at only US$4.00 a bottle.

Now it is time to see the back streets and what they don’t want the tourist to see!! Hiring a driver for the morning we check out the cigar factory. As luck would have it’s the MonteCristo Cigar factory, rated number two in the world behind another Cuban brand, Cohiba. The factory has 250 employees all producing 100% hand made cigars (totalmente a mano) and they turn out 20,000 a day. Unfortunately they would not let us take any photographs of these hard working locals that earn about US$15 a month.

The back streets show the other side. Dirt roads dug up trying to repair water pipes that have not been touched since before the revolution in 1959, bland Soviet Union built tenements which are free to all Cubans and people reverting to horse and cart due to lack of fuel. What does come as a surprise is that most people are well dressed. It’s just the in fore structure around that is in bad disrepair and what will happen if this continues much longer.

The only advertising you see are large billboards with images of the founding revolutionaries including Fidel and Che promoting the 50th anniversary of the success on 1 January 1959. Cuba has been a communist country ever since and the signs of this failed dream are everywhere. Fidel Castro overthrew a corrupt capitalist government that had been sponsored by the USA since 1899. Before these times it had been controlled by Spain, since Columbus arrived in 1492 until the Spanish land owners rebelled against control by Spain in 1868. Another rebellion was led by Marti in 1895 which resulted in the US involvement.

On a happier note the Santiago de Cuba musical festival has just started and this will make our stay very special.