Pilote's travel Blog no. 2, Varadero, Cuba

I haven’t talked about the sea yet, it is the Caribbean and it does have the brilliant turquoise color we have come to associate with it. Unfortunately the weather has been really crappy, huge wind, big scary waves with lots of foam. We haven’t been able to go swimming yet which is a total drag. This weather is expected to last till Tuesday with a gradual improvement on Monday.  Today we started walking towards Varadero center, the town is like one long strip without too many curves. There isn’t much of a center, a few restaurants, a few mercados nothing too interesting in terms of crafts. I think Cuba is mostly about the rum and the cigars with the odd wooden sculpture or leather item thrown in. It does not have the cultural craft richness of Mexico.  We ended up hopping on a double decker bus, 10$ for the two of us but you can get off and on at will.  We rode it all the way to the end where the big 4 and 5 stars all inclusive are, mostly with security gates and difficult to view from the vantage of the bus.  I’m sure the rooms are more luxurious and the food is probably better, with more a la carte restaurants to choose from. We only have one restaurant a la carte at Club Karey and you have to reserve otherwise it’s buffet style, plentiful but rather bland, they make little use of pepper or spices.  The all inclusive advantage, you don’t have to go running around for a place to eat but I know we’ll be very bored with the menu after 2 weeks in the same place.  The one interesting thing most of the guests here are Russian, yes the place is crawling with them.  Maybe they still have a fondness in their hearts leftover for Cuba from their Communist days.  In so far as the internet is concerned our search has come up empty.  We keep being told there’s internet at this hotel or that hotel but it never pans out.  Tomorrow we will try to find the one and only internet café in Varadero, 4 computers and it’s the old dial up so it’s going to be very slow going.  We’ve decided on two excursions we’re going to do, they’re not cheap, we must choose wisely but Havana is a definite.  Some Canadians arrived today and they thought Club Karey was heavenly. They had the all inclusive from hell near the airport, dirty and NO WATER. They complained so much that the company had to move them. No water is an absolute deal breaker, don’t blame them at all.