- Just Another Day in Paradise
- About The Food
- A Typical Day at an All Inclusive
- Just Like The Next Day
- In Transit
- Departure: T-Minus One (Day)
Just Another Day in Paradise
Wednesday, February 16, 2005
Our second day at Los Corales gets off to the usual start. Slightly hung over, tired from not sleeping well. Still it could be worse: I could be waking up in the midst of a Southwestern Ontario winter. Instead, the breeze is balmy and the view from the balcony is serene.
First order of business, after breakfast, is seeing about renting a car. We don?t know what day we want it yet, but we decide we?ll talk to Charlie the bartender to see if he?s interested in taking us in a guided tour of Santiago. We had planned to do that with him last year but it all fell apart when we learned that we had to make an exorbitant deposit on a rented car. This year, the cars are cheap: $77 pesos for the day including insurance, plus gas. You pay for a full tank up front and are reimbursed for whatever you don?t use. There are some nice little Hyundai?s parked out front, brand new and air conditioned. We make arrangements later in the day for Charlie to accompany us on Friday, his day off, and reserve a car (on Thursday) for Friday?s trip.
Later in the day Redman and I head off to the beach for some snorkelling and manage to find the part of the reef we saw last year where all the fish are. I haven?t been snorkelling since we were here last year and once again I?m blown away by the view. The reef isn?t terribly colourful, but the fish are. I didn?t ?find Nemo? but I did see a lot of his buddies: whole schools of bright yellow fish, some gorgeous ones with purple backs and yellow bellies, little black and white striped ones, lots of big silvery ones, and one huge gray mottled mother with a high triangular head. Redman encounters a very large black fish (not a ray) which seems to get bigger every time he tells the story. It didn?t exactly attack him but it was paying him some interest. I don?t stay in long though. I?m one of those people who doesn?t like to swim on deep water because I don?t like to imagine what?s below me. Somehow KNOWING what?s below me, however interesting, is not that comforting. Plus I live in fear that a sudden wave or current is going to send me crashing into one of those jagged coral outcrops that I?m trying hard not to swim too close to.
What?s nice about the beach here is it?s pretty well groomed but they haven?t gone on a binge of chopping down all the trees like they do at some resorts. There are lots of shade trees, the ever-present palms, plus mangrove and some other tree with a smaller leaf. There?s the usual palm frond shelters and, of course, beach chairs, but never enough of them.
However, on the topic of the beach chairs, there may appear to be a lot of them but over half of them are broken in some way. This is the same at the pool. The backs don?t stay up or are missing or the seats and or backs are split. Some chairs have been ?repaired? by sticking a cane or stick of some sort into the angle-adjustment slots behind the chair back, and for the most part this makes them sturdier than they were originally. They are plagued by a design flaw: if anyone heavier than 125 lbs tries to lean back on one, the back bends or twists so that the pegs that are meant to fit into these slots just pop out, and the back flops down. There are, believe me, plenty of folks here who weigh more than 125 lbs.
Added to the shortage of beach chairs is the fact that people like to head down to the beach before breakfast and ?claim? theirs for the day. You know they?ve been claimed but the owner is elsewhere, because there?s a towel or sheet on them, but no beach bag in evidence. People find unique ways of claiming chairs. One set has been tied together with a ribbon of some sort, around a post, and has a rock on one of them. I desperately feel like using them anyhow. It?s not like someone owns them! The chairs belong to the hotel, and while I respect people?s personal property, since when does a rock belong to anyone? I tell ya, the nerve of some people. I?m finding the chair shortage way more annoying this year than last, and when you mention to the hotel staff that they need to replace the broken deck chairs, they say ?More are arriving next week?. Along with the bicycles, I presume.
Filed under Cuba Chronicles, Mar 11, 2005
About The Food
I kind of glossed over lunch and dinner in the previous entry, so I?m going to do kind of a blanket entry describing the food here. It?s nothing special but it is highly edible, and buffet eating encourages you to put way too much food on your plate. There doesn?t seem to be as much variety as in the past.
A typical dinner
At both lunch and dinner, there?s a salad bar which occasionally features lettuce but always has shredded cabbage, (red and white), carrot, tomato, picked beets (yum, my fave) often devilled eggs, stuffed tomatoes, olives, etc. There?s always a couple of kinds of dressing but the best thing is just to use olive oil and balsamic vinegar. I have salad twice a day, usually.
This year they have actual butter on the buffet which has been missing in the past. There?s always lots of fresh baked rolls and bread, which are really good. I usually have one with my breakfast and if I have pasta with lunch, then also. There?s also soup, but I never have it. At breakfast there?s always sliced cold cuts and processed cheese of some kind. I?m not sure why, but this seems to be a Cuban resort breakfast buffet staple, as it has been offered at every hotel we?ve been to, along with the ever-present hot dog chunks pretending to be sausages.
There?s usually a pasta bar at both lunch and dinner, in the grill area, which is appropriate because about 60% if the guests are Italian-Canadians. You load up your plate with various toppings: fresh tomato, green pepper, onion, garlic, what passes for prosciutto (sic), various herbs, etc. You pass it to the cook who tosses it with oil in a frying pan then adds cooked spaghetti and tomato sauce, if you want it. Parmesan cheese for topping afterwards is plentiful. I have this a few times during the week except when the line-up is impossibly long. Once I?m first in line and have to wait for him to figure out how to light the gas burner with a rolled up paper napkin.
Cooked vegetables are a bit of Russian roulette. Mostly they are pretty good but there?s not a lot of variety, which is why I usually do the salad thing. Usually to be found are some kind of orange-fleshed squash in big chunks, green beans, grilled eggplant - not to be missed if available, and something-or-other in tomato sauce. If baked or boiled potatoes are available they are excellent. If home fries are offered , they are sometimes not so good ? reheated, tough. There are always two kinds of rice: plain, buttered or herbed, and ?dirty rice? with red beans, which is typically Cuban - I eat a lot of this. The grill at lunch features French fries but I avoid these as I eat far too many of them at home.
A future dinner offering?
Meat is also a bit of a crap shoot. Chicken and pork are both abundant in Cuba but they seem to be very well exercised and though flavourful are usually quite tough. Pork cutlets are particularly fork-resistant as are the grilled chicken breasts. After chewing gum on the plane for a couple of hours on the way down, my jaw aches and this does not help. The best chicken I had was a braised thigh, flavoured with rosemary. Delicious! The best bet for beef is anything with a sauce, often oxtail or fricassee which is usually incredibly tender and tasty. Every night they feature roasted ?something?. In past years they had a whole array of stations with various roasted meats but this year there?s just one, and you have to get here early to get any. The night of our arrival it was pork but we got only shreds of crackling. On one night there?s huge haunch of something dark with a gigantic bone sticking out of it; I figure it must be Mastodon. The carver says it?s ?bool?. Whatever it is, it?s not bad. Also featured during the week are goat, (might have been one of the ones that wander onto the property from the neighbouring field!) On other nights turkey, a very large fish, and lamb. There are a couple of roasting spits outside the buffet area where I presume some of these animals are prepared, but we never actually see it take place.
The grill also features fish, chicken and sometimes pork. The grilled fish I?ve had here in the past was wonderful, but whatever species that was seems to be in short supply this time of year. Instead we get some kind of fish ?steaks? that are very firm fleshed and full of bones, so they are a chore to eat. On another day there?s a very strong tasting dark fleshed fish not unlike sardine. I don?t eat as much fish this year.
One day late in the week, for variety we eat on the beach, where they serve hamburgers, hot dogs and sausage from the grill next to the beach bar (new this year). They are all OK but the hamburgers have a lot of filler. Still, it makes a change.
To finish, there are abundant sweet treats, which are typically Cuban and always freshly baked. I cannot describe them all but Redman?s favourite is flan (custard with caramel sauce baked on) and my favourite is the fruit tart, sort of a cross between a pie and a fruit crumble, with a biscuit-like crust. Also at breakfast is a wonderful sweet bread and sugar cookies which are not overly sugary. In order to get to the sweets, one must usually shoo away a few cheeky sparrows, who come to feast on the crumbs.
The best thing about it? I don?t have to cook it. The worst thing? Lining up for 20 minutes for popular items, if you are late arriving.
Filed under Cuba Chronicles, Mar 3, 2005
A Typical Day at an All Inclusive
Tuesday, February 15, 2005
We slide easily into the routine of idleness established on last years visit, without a lot of variation from day to day. Get up around 8:00, Redman showers. I don?t bother as I intend to spend the day in or near water. I dress in my bathing suit with shorts and a tank top over it. Yes, a bathing suit CAN double as a foundation garment. We are both hung over. This must NOT be a daily occurrence.
Breakfast around 8:30 am. I avail myself of an omelette made to order by a smiling senorita and the best fresh squeezed orange juice this side of heaven: it is truly Ambrosia. No bacon this morning - they have it later in the week and it is pretty good, though in past years it has been non-existent, but they do have those hot dog chunks that substitute for sausages (what the heck, I like ?em) and in the interest of maintaining my fibre intake I try a bowl of cereal. It turns out to be cinnamon frosted flakes, yuck. Some lovely sweet bread, flaccid pancakes, home fries, coffee. I try the coffee black but I?m not impressed. I?m dying for an espresso, but I can?t figure out how to get any.
Quick walk to the beach, not a cloud in the sky and Redman records the temperature at 82 degrees Fahrenheit on the new digital thermometer he now takes everywhere. At 10:00 we go off to the lobby to see the tour rep, and learn there is a mass meeting in the ?multi-use? room for all the guests that arrived with us last night. Not much new to tell us but that the hotel is no longer owned by Club Valtur, who owned it last year, but it is now owned by Club Amigo - the Cubans - again.
Last year, we arrived to find out this property, Los Corales, had been sold to Club Valtur, and was no longer being offered by the tour company we had booked with, so on arrival we were taken to another hotel on an adjoining property. It would have been nice if they had told us this when we specifically booked this property, but apparently our travel agent was never informed. On our visit in 2003 the two properties were joined, and guests were free to use the amenities of both. Not so in 2004. The Carisol property was nice enough and the food good, but all programs were in French and there was not an English-speaking guest in sight. We complained until our tour rep. got us a bracelet for Los Corales, so we were allowed to ?visit?, eat and drink here. We ended up spending most of our time here.
In other news, we learn that although scooters and bicycles are not available, rental cars are, and at a rate much lower than in the past. We decide we will definitely check this out. Other tours are described, but we?ve been on them all. The hotel?s Guest Representative asks who is a return visitor and we give her our room number. There are rumours of a special reception later in the week.
Off to the pool, where my ?happy place?
chair is available. The pool is still too cold, they still don?t heat it. I
start working on a suntan burn and get out my book, The Mists of
Avalon, which I brought for the week. It?s an excellent read. After a while
Redman gets antsy so we walk over to the Carisol to see what?s up over there.
Nothing much has changed but the cigar guy is no longer set up in the lobby,
he?s not at Los Corales this year either. Redman is disappointed. Back to our
hotel and lunch via the beach.
After lunch, we head back to the beach and Redman goes snorkelling. I?m up for a dip but the water is rough so I decide not to snorkel. Redman says there are no fish anyway but doesn?t think he went to the right spot. We?ll try it again tomorrow. Back to the pool to hang out and I end up in the pool over by the bar trying to alternately stay warm/cool in the sun/water. I start talking to a woman named Donna from Seaforth, and it turns our she works in retail for Canada Post. It further turns out our city is part of her territory and that she was, at one time, Redman?s ex?s supervisor! Small freaking world. (At this point I start to go over what I?ve said in the last while to remember what disparaging comments I?ve made about the boys? mother.) I say, ?Of course you know I. B., who is a friend of ours.? I. is a great friend of Donna?s, as it happens. Of course.
Her husband Rob joins us. He and Redman start shooting the shit and he starts making all sorts of homophobic jokes about our home town. What an asshole, is my first impression. Still he is lively and reasonably funny, and I do like her, so we hang out for a while. We also meet up with some other people from Wingham so it?s old home week for the Huron County residents, leaving us in sole defence of Perth County.
About 4:00 we decide to grab a couple of ?real? beers (Cristal) in the lobby store and head back to our room, but the store is closed. Rats. We sit out on our balcony which has a pleasant ?garden? view, and listen to some tunes on Redman?s i-Pod, then decide to lie down for a nap. Later I shower and change for dinner.
After dinner and drinks we meet up with our new friends, catch the show, and eventually wander off to the beach bar for a repeat of last night?s shenanigans. The group collectively known as ?Wingham? is there with their three teenagers. The boy, who is 17 and sort of preppy-nerdy, does the salsa with Donna and I, but he gets it wrong. Although I?m sticking to water at this point, I?m too drunk/tired to learn the right way, plus it?s hard dancing in the sand. The song Tiny Dancer runs through my head the rest of the night.
Though I?m exhausted when we finally get back to our room sometime after midnight, I can?t sleep. This proves to be the norm for the rest of the week. Too late a night!
Filed under Cuba Chronicles, Mar 1, 2005
Just Like The Next Day
Monday, February 14, 2005 (evening)
Where I used to work, we got laid off for five months of the year. However, the day you went back to work, it always seemed like it was just The Next Day. It was like the intervening months never happened.
It sort of felt like that at Los Corales this year. Although technically we didn?t STAY there last year, we were there every day for drinks, sometimes dinner, and to use the pool. (It?s a long story in itself so perhaps I?ll explain later, or as I go along.) Anyway, the first evening there, to me, anyway, felt like we had never left.
Sometime after dinner and before a Mohito in the lobby bar, (which has changed it?s decor since we were last here from a ?jazz? theme to some sort of dowdy-looking boathouse complete with oars hanging from the ceiling and fishing nets) Redman gets the safe key for our room from reception and we put all our valuables in it: our extra Canadian cash, my credit cards, our passports and plane tickets. The safe costs two pesos* a day, which we pay when we check out. While you probably don?t need to worry much about theft there, it does give peace of mind so we always do it.
*A ?peso convertible? is equivalent to one U.S. dollar, which they don?t take in Cuba any more, so we have to get Canadian money exchanged at reception. It?s convenient not to have to buy U.S. dollars any more before we come here, but we still get hit with the same exchange.
On the way to the lobby bar we ran into our amigo Francisco, a bartender who we have known for the last two years. We are greeted with hugs and kisses (well, kisses for me anyway!) and exclamations of ?You Da Maaaan!?, his standard greeting for Redman.
Last year after our return home, we sent him a care package of children?s vitamins for his three little daughters plus a tensor bandage for his bad knee, and a framed photo Redman had taken of him and his family when he brought them to the hotel for a visit. He assures us he had gotten everything we sent him. We came with more gifts this year: a bigger bottle of vitamins, some t-shirts and hair barrettes for the girls and a mini-multi-tool for him, which we bring to the ?theatre? bar later in the evening. He is ecstatic. ?My wife will be so thankful,? he tells us. He has fun playing with the tool, which includes pliers, scissors and a knife. He is his usual animated self at the bar, clowning for the guests. Where we left him last year was right at this bar, the night before our departure. So it?s fitting we renew our acquaintance here.
While there we catch a bit of the evening?s entertainment, which appears to feature a gaggle of female dancers with pretty much bare behinds, who, even I have to admit, though I don?t have a particular predilection for that sort of thing, are pretty adorable. Redman finds it all terribly interesting, of course. Once the show is over we decide to take a walk down to the beach, in the dark, where we discover the beach bar is re-opened nightly as a disco at 11:00 pm. There is an outdoor wooden dance floor. The music and the rum drinks inspire me to want to dance in the worst way (that?s want in the worst way, not dance in the worst way.) But Redman refuses to dance with me. Someone made fun of him once, apparently. So I offer to make a complete ass of myself by dancing alone, but nobody notices. At least Redman graciously declares that he found my dancing rather nice.
Finally we decide it?s time for bed, which is only a double size and very narrow for us. It?s OK if both of us behave ourselves and don?t spread out too much, but the mattress is hard and I don?t sleep very well. The next morning I wake up tired, stiff, and hung over.
In other words, in great shape to kick off an entire week of sloth.
Filed under Cuba Chronicles, Feb 26, 2005
In Transit
Monday, February 14, 2005
I hate waiting to go somewhere. Flying south seems like just one waiting room after another. You wait in the terminal, then you wait on the plane to get there which is sort of like just sitting in another room.. Then you wait in arrivals for your bags, and then you wait for the bus to the hotel.
We leave the Day?s Inn on the 7:30 shuttle, not wanting to be TOO casual about our check-in at the airport despite the Hola Sun?s rep telling us otherwise. True to his word, there?s not that much of a line up once we get there, we are quickly through, manage to get emergency exit row seats and so begins the three hour+ terminal wait. We decide to get something for breakfast but neither of us is very hungry. I want juice however, and only orange juice would do. We line up at Williams Coffee Pub for what seems like an hour and a girl in line two persons ahead of me gets the last OJ. So I have to settle for grapefruit, a distant second.
There?s not much to do in the outer part of the terminal so we go ahead and enter the gates area, passing uneventfully through security on the way. I used to have to take out my digital camera and put the battery in for them, now they don?t even care about it. I guess they?ve become pretty commonplace.
Terminal three is huge and it?s a long walk to our departure gate. Where we wait and wait some more. The time comes and goes for boarding but we are told there?s a problem with the catering, seems they delivered the wrong meals, so we have to wait until they fix that. A half hour delay. Finally we board, then are told they need to de-ice the wings. We take some time to appreciate our surroundings. The plane is a nice new A-320, 6 seats across, and in the emergency exit row, plenty of leg room. The stewards are all Cuban. They have many rules and they are very stern. We may not leave any bags under the seats and must have seatbelts fastened at all times while seated.
Once the wings are de-iced we start to approach the runway, and the captain tells us we are 10th in line for takeoff. ?I am sorry for the incompetence?, he tells us. Once away it?s the usual routine: drinks cart, (I have a Cuba Libre to start things off but it?s not free.) A light lunch, (I wonder what we would have gotten if they didn?t fix the catering problem) a movie: Cinderella Story starring Hillary Duff. It?s deeply stupid but it passes the time. I have the centre seat and every time I try to look out the window, my seatmate, an elderly man from Poland visiting Cuba for the first time, sticks his big fat head in front of the window. I learn he?s travelling with his wife, a little wisp of a thing who never smiles, and his daughter, her husband, a baby and a small girl, all of whom visit our row on various occasions, bringing about stern warnings from the stewards.
Around 4:00 pm the plane lands in Camaguey to refuel, let off some passengers and take on more heading back to Toronto on the return loop. We have to wait on the plane, and it takes about an hour. Finally we?re up and away and in another hour we?re in Santiago: it?s now about 6:50 pm Cuba time, as they are still on day light savings time due to an energy crunch. Well, we figure we can still make dinner if they hurry up and let us through customs. Line up for a passport check (my picture looks nothing like me any more, which causes a long look) To the Baggage room to claim our bags. A big sign sys:
BAGGAGE CLIMB AREA
PLEASE CLIMB YOUR BAG, THEN WEIGH IT.
Redman lines up to exchange money while I?m waiting for the bags to appear and no one ever shows up at the exchange counter. Meanwhile, I?m wondering if you are supposed to be on top of the bag while you are weighing it. Anyway, everyone gets through, no one actually climbs their bag, we all board the busses, and then we wait for some other Polish couple with an infant and a large stroller who seem to be lost.
FINALLY everyone is ready and off we go to the hotel. I?ve been down this road a dozen times or so, and it hasn?t gotten any straighter or smoother. A fairly hair-raising ride, dodging potholes, goats, errant Cubans on mopeds and bicycles, and the odd cow. We get there about 8:00 pm, there?s an hour left for dinner service and we race to the check-in counter to be first to get our room. Redman decides he?ll arrange for a room safe after dinner. Beat off the bag boys, head to our room (we know the way) and after a very quick freshen up it?s off to the buffet. Now, our holiday has officially begun.
And I?m going to stop here if I?m EVER going to get this posted tonight, so more tomorrow.
Filed under Cuba Chronicles, Feb 24, 2005