Reflections on Cuba

Our time in Cuba might not have been the amazing, spectacular, wonderful journey we had imagined. It didn’t all go to plan—memorable for all the wrong reasons. However, we can’t leave our tale of Cuba on a negative note though. Glad as we were to return to Mexico, there is something intangible about that crazy, beguiling, frustrating, spellbinding, infuriating enigma of a country that calls us back.

We’ve already said a lot about Cuba, so here’s a blog post dedicated to the photos.

What cannot be denied is that Cuba, or what little we saw of it, is a very photogenic place. Some of these images featured in our earlier blog posts, some of these didn’t make the cut, but maybe they should have.

Reflecting on our time in Cuba, we find that even though it didn’t end up being the dream destination we had pictured in our heads, there was some strange magic to the place. Something special. As frustrating and trying as our time in Cuba had been, looking back at our photos we feel a sense of nostalgia. A sense of unfinished business. Perhaps it is time to return?

Well. Ben is a little more sensible than Emma, so he’s in no big rush to head back. After all it’s a big world out there and there’s a lot of countries we haven’t been to and a lot we’ve really enjoyed that we could go back to before Cuba.

Emma however can’t shake the memories of the warm glow of the sunset on Cuba’s crumbling Malecón.

Or the crashing storm waves breaking on the decaying sea wall.

Of the way the shifting light picked out the details in the disintegrating doorways.

The way ice cream cones were made on jagged, malformed, home-made moulds. How the streets of Havana were alive, bustling and full of the hustle and bustle of every day life. The vibrant music floating and twisting from doorways and windows, breathing life into the surrounding streets.

The way the early morning mist clung to the hillsides in Viñales.

The chaos and clatter of a hand-made rural fairground.

Probably not that mural though.

Flan in a can, however. That is probably worth returning for.

So we’ll see. For now, there is still a lot to experience on our journey south. But maybe one day in the future, the call to return to Cuba will become an irresistible pull that we cannot deny. Perhaps we’ll go back and fall in love with this country. Or perhaps we’ll go back and remember why we left in the first place.

With a bit of luck, Ben’s good sense will prevail and we’ll see the rest of the world first…