Pilote's Travel Blog no. 3 - The Great Internet Caper

The Great Internet Caper

The day progressed rather uneventfully.  The weather was still crappy with lots of wind although the sun did start appearing here and there.  We walked all the way into Varadero and back, approximately 10 kms.

Our quest was for an elusive internet connection at calle (street) no. 30. We found it stocked with 4 computers, only 3 were working. I had to buy a card, 6 pesos for one hour.  We get 95 centavos for every Canadian dollar, the cost therefore was about $7.50 an hour that’s the most I’ve ever paid for an internet connection.  It’s all dial up and exceedingly slow, we also had to wait about 1 hour for a computer to become available.  Cuba is not an easy place to manoeuvre from that point of view.  There is a satellite provided by the Russians but because of the U.S. embargo the wireless connection is very difficult to have (border issues) not sure I understood when it was explained to me in Spanish.  Sent an email to the family, should have no problem getting there.

Some observations:

It’s generally clean, much less options to buy therefore less plastic crap on the street.

Crime rate is very low here, higher in a bigger city like Havana but there are no cops, only security outfits which are not very visible.

No soldiers either which is a big change from Mexico and other Latin American countries.

The t.v. reception is abominable, barely watchable.

There are no book exchanges which are common in most of the small hotels we’ve been in during our travels.

The food is very very bland.

It’s very quiet, no hustle and bustle, no street music at least not where we are.  Heard a band today in Varadero centro.

Of course we are hoping for better weather tomorrow so we can go swimming or attempt sunbathing but for the moment Cuba Si is more like Cuba NO.