{"id":5189,"date":"2018-12-04T20:46:31","date_gmt":"2018-12-05T04:46:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/?p=5189"},"modified":"2018-12-06T08:35:51","modified_gmt":"2018-12-06T16:35:51","slug":"running-without-a-map-havana-cuba-12-04-2018","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/?p=5189","title":{"rendered":"Running without a Map \u2013 Havana, Cuba \u2013 [12\/04\/2018]"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"It\u2019s so easy in this day and age to plan every single moment of your day. We have maps in our phones, and plans in our heads all the time. Every hour laid out with precision levels. Even Amras and I are guilty of that, and honestly, sometimes we have<\/em> to be; often times we only have a few hours out in port before we have to rush back to the ship and planning becomes essential to get the most out of those few hours. But we didn\u2019t always<\/em> used to be that way. My phone is international (and therefore expensive) and Amras? Amras didn\u2019t used to have a phone. So, back when we first met our theme usually went something like this:<\/p>\n

Where are you guys going today?<\/em><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t know, we haven\u2019t gotten there yet.<\/em><\/p>\n

We lost that somewhere, well, didn\u2019t lose it exactly, but life just stalled on being able to accomidate it.<\/p>\n

Until we got a long<\/em> port.<\/p>\n

When we walked out in Havana I had a vague idea of the few things I wanted to show him; as I\u2019ve had a couple of calls here already this season. But we were struck by disappointment on front after front when we discovered that the day everything is closed in Havana? Is not Sunday, it\u2019s Monday \u2013 and of course, we were here on a Monday. So, no museums or historical fortresses for us. Which led to me being a little more sulky than I should have been, because hey, I had a plan, and it didn\u2019t work, and that\u2019s not particularly my favourite spot to be in.<\/p>\n

So instead we just\u2026started wandering.<\/p>\n

I had never been further in Havana than about a five block radius from the terminal, because the streets are those beautifully twisty turny kind and it\u2019s relatively easy to get yourself going in the wrong direction. I didn\u2019t ever feel unsafe, but I do<\/em> have a tendency to get lost. So when I was on my own it was safer to stay close to home so to speak. Anyway, it didn\u2019t take long before we were in uncharted territory for me.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Amras was looking for a central square, I was honestly convinced he wasn\u2019t going to find one \u2013 because Old Havana didn\u2019t seem to be laid out that way. I should have known better. After about an hour\u2019s more of walking (and poking through market stalls, and drinking fresh squeezed sugar cane juice \u2013 which was beyond yummy \u2013 the twisting small streets opened up onto the capitol square. Yeah, I should have known better. Suddenly we were strolling across a vast open cobble-stoned space, lined on one side with horse-drawn carriages, and on the other? On the other with brightly coloured classic cars.<\/p>\n

Welcome to Cuba.<\/p>\n

I, being ever over eager, wanted to grab the first tour car we saw (which as I recall was red and white), but we ended up waiting, and that turned out to be a really really<\/em> good decision (more on that later). Instead we sat at a nearby resteraunt and sipped a real Cuban Mojito, and watched all the people go by in the shadow of the Capitol building. It is wonderfully refreshing to sit alongside a main street and not see<\/em> a single chain store. No plastic souvenir shops, no Del Sol, no diamonds international. This place isn\u2019t catering to us, we just happen to be<\/em> here.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve wanted to do a classic car tour since I found out we were coming to Havana; and there were a lot<\/em> of cars to choose from. Most of which were shiney shiney pink and bright blues and such. None of those really caught our eye. We were just about to go and scope out our options, when we found the exact one we were supposed to end up with. A slightly well-worn 1948 Dodge, painted pink and white, driven by a man who had the kindest eyes we\u2019d seen in a long while. Unlike his colleagues he didn\u2019t simply holler out to us, he came up to us, almost immediately, and while his price was a little bit higher than the others\u2026I knew<\/em> this was the one we wanted.<\/p>\n

And did it ever<\/em> prove to be worth it.<\/p>\n

The driver was amazingly friendly, and took us to parts of the city we never could have made it to on our own. And as we cruised down into the residential neighbourhood, he looked over his shoulder and asked if we wanted to stop somewhere for a drink.<\/p>\n

And that, is how you end up being the only ones in a French-cuban caf\u00e9, sipping a (very weak) pina colada, listening to the house trio play just for you; singing along with cuban renditions of beetles songs (of all things). As if you were the most important people they\u2019d seen in their whole day.<\/p>\n

To us, and all those marvelous adventures we promised we\u2019d have\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

And just as suddenly, the trio starts into something we never could have expected; they started playing Stand By Me<\/em>. If they could have picked any song\u2026.any song from anywhere\u2026<\/p>\n

If Amras and I have a song, that\u2019s it. Has been for years. It was \u2018our\u2019 song before there was an \u2018us\u2019 to have<\/em> a song.<\/p>\n

I sat there for a moment in rather stunned silence, and then Amras nudged me and stretched out his hand\u2026<\/p>\n

And asked me to dance\u2026<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t know how many of my readers have dated musicians, but\u2026band girlfriends (and wives, and fianc\u00e9s) don\u2019t get danced with. Groupies get danced with, fans get danced with, lonely looking little old ladies in the front row get danced with\u2026but girlfriends? We don\u2019t get danced with. We get everything else<\/em>, but not dances\u2026<\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t need the pina colada to feel light-headed.<\/p>\n

By the time our driver dropped us back at central park, it was starting to get dark. And Cuba at night is beautiful<\/em>, I expected Havana to be a party town, and I\u2019m sure that it is<\/em> after a certain time of night. But in the early evening? The streets are almost empty, and it almost feels like Europe. All small sidewalk cafes and quiet whispers.<\/p>\n

We had dinner in the same caf\u00e9 that apparently was once frequented by Ernest Hemingway (and the food there was delicious) and then spent the rest of the night wandering through twisting alleyways, eating hand made ice cream in the shadow of huge cathedrals.<\/p>\n

Some days aren\u2019t about the planning, or the souvenirs, or the perfect photographs\u2026some days don\u2019t come with a map\u2026<\/p>\n

And so many times\u2026those days? End up being the very very best<\/em> days of all.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s so easy in this day and age to plan every single moment of your day. We have maps in our phones, and plans in our heads all the time. Every hour laid out with precision levels. Even Amras and … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[103,86,12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5189","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cuban-dreams","category-fall-contracts","category-historical-sites"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3GtNE-1lH","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5189","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5189"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5189\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5195,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5189\/revisions\/5195"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5189"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5189"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5189"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}