Viva La Revolucion... (pt 3 of 3)

V i n a l e s

The sleepy little town of Vinales seems to have become quite a major tourist destination without being overrun like so many places on the planet. There's a couple of big hotels out of town in the hills, but the town itself is still the snoozy little farming town it's always been - surrounded by tobacco plantations in a rich valley enclosed by amazing limestone cliffs called mogotes. The valley is actually a UNESCO world heritage site, though the locals don't really seem to care as they quietly go about their lives - riding donkey carts out to the field and harvesting tobacco leaves...

[click on pic for full size]

As with Trinidad, we stayed in peoples homes "casas" again - our hosts in Trinidad had actually called trough to friends of theirs to expect us. At the end of a little track just off the main road was a little house that belonged to Mario and Elizabeth - "Las Bicarios"

These two (both old enough and short enough to be our grandparents) were the nicest people I think I've ever met. They didn't speak a word of english but were happy to sit and chat in broken spanish to me - and if we didn't understand a good laugh would erupt and we;d move on to something else...

[l-r Elizabeth's daughter (back for new years eve), Elizabeth, Mario and John]

Elizabeth could really cook as well!! We'd planned on staying for a night or two and ended up there for four nights - every night being treated to a vast array of fresh fruit and salads and fish or pork (as well as the obligatory rice and beans...)

Sleepy Vinales waking up
(you can see one of the mogote rock formations in the background)
The vinales valley
The government has set up this little tourist bus that drives around the valleys all day and you just get on and off as you please for one price - or you can ride bikes or horses
(there's no traffic coz no one owns a car..)
As the limestone is porous, there are huge networks of caves
throughout the area (some stretch for 10's of km)

Here's a video of us inside one (it's full of water so we're in a little boat)


This is where the boat eventually come out - quite bizarre...
the main mode of transport around here is man or animal powered
thought the roads are often lined with people hoping to catch a lift on a truck or one of the occasional buses
Everyone around here has beautiful - well maintained gardens
The main export form the Vinales valley is tobacco.
This is inside one of the huge drying huts
(unfortunately a lot of these were damaged last season by hurricane Gustav)
As smoking cigars comes a close second to drinking rum as the top national pastime around here, you need blokes like this who can roll cigars in their sleep!! This guy could create a work of art in a minute or two whilst chatting away and still smoking his own cigar (balancing on the corner of his desk in the bottom half of the picture) - classy stuff!!