On 11 March 2017, the day after 10 March, we went to Cayo Coco island, from Camaguey in Cuba. In the morning in Camaguey, these flowers. And house sparrows.
Cave swallows flying around. They have nests under the bridge.
This video says about itself:
26 January 2016
A Cave Swallow works on its nest in a cave in Santiago de Cuba, Cuba. These birds are colonial and place their nests on a vertical wall, usually in the twilight zone of a cave or sinkhole. They make their flattened cup nests of mud pellets, sometimes with sides extending up and enclosing the bowl. Nests may be covered, with a small entrance tunnel on one side, and are lined with grass and plant fibers.
After nearly two years of planning, a team of scientists from the US and Cuba has explored never-before-studied mesophotic coral reefs during a month-long circumnavigation of the entire coast of Cuba, spanning about 1,500 miles. Except for a few places along the coast, prior to this expedition, there were virtually no data or charts indicating what was beyond the shallow reef zone: here.
After arriving in Santa Clara city in Cuba on 8 March 2017, we woke up on 9 March. The pupils had woken up as well, and walked to their schools.
The flower shop people had woken up was well. And the house sparrows.
We continued to the Che Guevara mausoleum. In December 1958, the dictator of Cuba, Fulgencio Batista, had sent an armoured train full of weapons, ammunition and soldiers east to destroy Fidel Castro’s rebel army. However, Che managed to stop the train with a tractor of the local school of Agronomy. The Batista officers asked for a truce; the private soldiers fraternized with the rebels, saying that they were tired of fighting against their own people. Che’s troops captured the armoured train. This was such a blow to Batista that within 12 hours he fled Cuba to fellow dictator Trujillo of the Dominican Republic, taking much of the treasury of the Cuban government with him: worth a billion (1 January 1959, pre-inflation) United States dollars. Batista then moved to another dictatorial country: Portugal. Finally, he died in 1973 in Spain, two years before Francisco Franco, the dictator of that country.
Decades after Che was murdered in Bolivia on the orders of the CIA, his remains were brought to Santa Clara, to be buried in the mausoleum along with fellow fighters of the 1958 decisive battle.
We continue to the Cuevas de los Portales; caves near a river valley. A Cuban solitaire sings. In 1962, Che Guevara lived in these caves. The Cuban government feared that after the 1961 Playa Giron invasion, there would come another United States military incursion: not this time of a relatively small force of CIA mercenaries as in 1961, but of ten thousands of regular United States soldiers in that Cuban missile crisis year. If that would happen, Che intended to wage guerilla against the invasion forces from the Cuevas de los Portales.
Our earlier blog post mentioned our arrival in Viñales town. There, still on 6 March 2017, we saw this Cuban parrot. A pet, not a wild bird. This species lives only in Cuba, the Bahamas and Cayman islands. The pet trade did much damage to Cuban parrots; but recently, conservation measures seem to work and the numbers of wild parrots are increasing again.
The next day, 7 March, we went up a mountain trail in Viñales National Park. 7 March 2017 was our second full day in Cuba. And our second day in the Viñales region.
Then, we continued to Pinar del Rio city. To a building which in the 1950s used to be a torture prison of dictator Batista. After the 1959 revolution, all political prisoners were freed. The building became a cigar factory which it still is today. It is open to the public.
In the factory hangs a poster of the late President Fidel Castro smoking a cigar. As he did. Later, he stopped smoking, as tobacco is not healthy, even though Cuban cigars do not cause as much damage as cigarettes.
In the factory courtyard, a quote by Fidel Castro.
Cuban cigars have the reputation of being the best in the world. We saw the workers make them by hand from three parts: filler, binder, and wrapper. 60% of this skilled work is done by women. At the factory entrance, a sign wished women well for International Women’s Day which would come next day, on 8 March.
House sparrows on the building.
In the afternoon, we went from the place where tobacco leaves turn into cigars to a place where tobacco leaves have their earlier stages.
We arrived at a lake. An artificial lake, made for firefighters to have water against wildfires. It attracted birds: brown pelicans. A little blue heron. An anhinga flying.
Palm leaf roof buildings are especially for processing tobacco for the famous Cuban cigars.
We pass mountains, with typically west Cuban shapes.
At a viewpoint, a small shop with, eg, Che Guevara t-shirts.
We arrived in Viñales. Stay tuned!
This video says about itself:
Viñales is a beautiful valley with limestone (karst) landscape. It is declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
According to UNESCO: “The Viñales Valley is an outstanding karst landscape in which traditional methods of agriculture (notably tobacco growing) have survived unchanged for several centuries.”
In the video: Viñales town, views to the valley from Los Jasmines & La Ermita, Mural de la Prehistoria, Los Aquaticos, Gruta de Viñales (or de Silencio?), Cueva del Indio, Cueva de San Miguel (and Palenque de los Cimarrones), and more …
Recorded April 2015 in 4K (Ultra HD) with Sony AX100.
