Cuba, South-West coast and Isla Juventud

April 7 - 25, 2016
We had to stop in Las Moras for the check-in to Cuba. Otherwise, this place doesn't have any attractions. The cost guard guys saw us on the radar, and commanded to dock at their dilapidated concrete dock, which have seen better times and now is just dangerous for docking. The surge was so bad that we were seriously afraid for our boat to be damaged (remembering the nightmare in Los Mojes island) But we survived this rough night, and gladly left in the morning. The next stop was La Bajas, a little village in the Bahia Carriente. It's possible that this village used to be a prosperous fishing settlement, but these days there are no any boat is found around there, very strange. We woke up from the coast guard's request (over VHF) to sail immediately to Maria La Gorda for check-in. Funny, but the guard doesn't have a boat to conduct his business, so the cruisers supposed to pick him up and drop him off on his demand.-There are couple mooring balls around, but cruisers are not allowed to use them, and the bottom doesn't have very good holding. This is a beautiful place, with very transparent waters and white sand beach along the whole coast of the bay. There is a diving resort where we paid for our stay in this bay (cost us 10 CUCs, this is the other Cuban currency for tourists, 1CUC is roughly 1EU), everybody has to pay even if you stay on the anchor. The purchased resort ticket included drinks, the cheapest one was rum - $0.50.
It's not much to do here, or to buy anything. We spent our days snorkeling, swimming and trying to catch lobsters or fish (however, without positive results). It seems that this place is very popular tourist place: we were surprised to meet a lot of US tourists, among others from different countries, yesterday two 150 feet sailboats showed up filled with tourist (the flag was Greek), and today we woke up from the loud intercom messaged from the big cruise boat Celestyal Cruises.
Fished today again... Kevin spired one little (baby) crab, hardly enough for a snack. It's just a row of unfortunate attempts for fishing: first was an unfortunate eye horse jack - it was huge! and we thought it's a pompano fish, but we found his description in the book, and "oh,well, it has to go over board", they have ciguteria; second was unfortunate huge lobster we spotted near the cliffs - Kevin shoot and wounded him multiple times, but it got away; third was an unfortunate little baby crab.. but it was very tender and tasty!
Almost all the day today Kevin spent helping Drew from "La Cruz" to fix battery problem, and we hope tomorrow afternoon we will be off for Isla Juventud.
Unfortunately, we had to motor sail all the way (22 hours) to the anchorage in Isla Juventud, at the anchorage at the entrance of the Marina Colony. We separated with our friends from La Cruz,; they went to Nueva Gerona to try to extend their visas. We really hate to go East, but there is no other ways as motoring into the wind! I guess, we will have these conditions all the way to the Cayo Largo.
Next day we planned to visit a capital Nueva Gerona on the north site of the island. There were couple options available to do so, including a car rental for $60, but luckily, we were able to catch a public bus from the nearby Hotel Colony. From the marina we walked about 20 min to the hotel (if you lucky, you can potentially spot a crocodile in the little pond near the road, we did not), where we were able to use internet!!!! for 30 min for $1. It was very slow, loading of emails and sending two took about all the time, but that was a nice surprise. Very conveniently we spotted a public bus departing for Gerona. That was a treat to take this bus: it cost only 1 CUC (we overpaid). We stopped in every little village to pick up and drop off locals, and we participated in conversation with the local women, who were very friendly and happy (finally Kevin had a chance to give a pencil to one lady). About pencils and other "gifts":  we were told by other cruisers that we absolutely have to bring pencils, pens, soap and candy for presents. However, for two weeks while staying in Cuba, we still were not able to use our little gifts as exchange for food or just as tokens of appreciation. The bus ride was long, more than an hour, but we saw the most of the Isla Juventud. The town Nueva Gerona reminded me much of my childhood in Soviet Union, the same cars (but looking very old, like Moskvich, Lada, Volga); people live in the same concrete block buildings, which desperately need a face lift; women dressed up in very bright colors, and  none of the closing items of outfits are matching (I guess, you wear what you can get?). We took a bicycle taxi (strange looking thing) to the town docks, and visited there our friends from La Cruz. The river was very very stinky and dirty (sewage discharge?), so we decided not to bring our boat here. At the local agromercado we bought fruits and veggies (which was about $3 for a load of food!). At the main street we stopped by at the Western Union hopping that maybe we can get money this way (our cards are not working in Cuba's ATMs, not yet...), but the sign in the window let us know there is  "No connection", so.. no money. It was very interesting to visit local supermarkets - all products have both prices in Cucs and pesos, and it's kind of cheap. We bought a little red bucket in one of the stores, very similar to our old one which we bought in Venezuela. That was a good deal too. There are not many choices in the food stores, which again, reminded me old Soviet times of my youth. In one store we saw a line of people for the big pork legs (and you have to bring your own rapping material), in the same store you could buy eggs, powdered soft drinks and alcohol (7 different types of Havana Club rum). I was excited to see Panaderia, and bought there "the bread" (there is only one kind of the bread in the whole big store). The other stores had some shoes (haha, the same ugly crap we had in our old Soviet stores), some ugly ladies outfits, multiple types of shampoo, soap, some electric appliances, and a lot of plastic goodies. All restaurants serve about the same food - all pork prepared in different ways, rice and plantains. For desert we got an ice cream at a little stand on the main street, dirt cheap - two for less than a $1, but you have to wait for your ice cream to freeze for about 20 min (the ice machine doesn't work very well). There was only one kind of ice cream - chocolate, and it was very sweet! At the nearby gas station we saw a tractor filling up with the gas, and oddly  enough, it was old soviet tractor of brand Belarus, I really felt like back in time at home in Ukraine. On the way back we had to take a taxi (only 15 cucs), because we missed our public bus (there are no any schedules available anywhere).
 
The weather prediction is not very suitable for our travel to Cayo Largo, again.. we have to wait a week before we can travel. Our next stop around the corner is just 15 miles away, the Punta Buenavista. The coverage against NE strong winds, which should hit us for another four days, should be sufficient here. We are the only boat around all west cost of the big island, and we feel very alone at this deserted place. During the day we tried to fish, got couple needle fishes, and that's all... well, the vegetarian supper today again. In the afternoon I spotted a local rowing on the weird looking water transportation, resembling the craft our friend Igor from Calcuta built himself.
 
Is you are looking for the total isolation from the human world, this is a place to stay - no radio, no internet, no phone, no people, no roads, no passing boats, just "nada", well, there is a flock of pelicans lives here. Sometimes total silence hurts your ears, and this is the case here... Today Kevin figured out that the diesel we bought in Marina Colony from a dive boat crew has more water than actually diesel content. We got screwed up by the Cubans a big deal, considering we spent our precious cash on this garbage. Kevin asked "how do they sleep at night?", I am sure they sleep wonderfully and planning another revenge action against stupid greengos.
We are in total isolation at these lonely bays of Isla Juventud - nobody is around, and it's very quiet. The radio has only one station which is a Communistic party station, and today for two hours we were listening Fidel Castro's speech about Cuban's achievements for the current Communistic party session in Havana. It's the same crap we had in Soviet Union all the day long on the radio. But it's a nice comprehension lesson in Spanish! Most of the songs are about revolution, and "International" is very popular too. They have an English station which transmits the same crap, but in English, crazy!
The next two nights we anchored in Ensenada de los Barcos. This is a very huge and very shallow bay, the protection from NE was ok, but the sound of hauling wind was very eerie at night, seemed like boat is going to drag any time. Because of the long distance to the shore we did not go explore around, and there were not actually anything around... as well as in the water of 7 feet deep, just mud...
There are no more convenient anchorages close by anymore, so we have to cover distance of 26 miles today. It took us eight hours of sailing (Oh yes, we finally sailed in Cuba!!!!) and motorsailing (last 3 miles, running from the rain) to Estero Simon anchorage. Finally we saw more live around - while passing Nueva Gerona channel, saw couple big fish boats and three small makeshift cubans "boats" (some look more like a raft, others like a former car???). The land looks interesting with a lot of low mountains (or rather high hills), but very dry and not much lush vegetation. We saw the whole complex of nice buildings composing a former prison, where Fidel Castro was kept during Batistas regime. Now it's a state museum (at least according to some guidebooks), but we did not find a dock to leave a dinghy near the prison. So, we gave up our only excursion to the land, and maybe for better, because theoretically we are not allowed to go to the shore without permission of the coast guards.
Early morning, just right before sunrise we were on our way to Pasa de Quitasol, did not have any problems crossing, the channel was very well marked. Surprisingly it took us only 7 hours of motorsailing upwind to the Canal de Rosario, where we finally saw other sailing boats (actually, just charters). Kevin discovered a new oil leak in the engine, and it doesn't look good. However, next day we had to use our sick engine again to take us to the last destination in Cuba, Cayo Largo. It took us 17 days to get from the north-west side of Cuba to the south. Going East, against the wind, really did not work for us well: instead of sailing we had to run our engine hard just to make right in time to the next stop, and we did not get much enjoyment staying at the deserted muddy "not a living thing around" anchorages all 15 days. We were exhausted physically and morally by the time we made it to Cayo Largo.


Cayo Largo, Cuba 

April 26, 2016
This place is very beautiful: water is clear and blue, there are reefs around (we did not swim there yet), which supposed to be populated with lobsters and big fish. Will see... We easily checked in at the Marina, met Sr.Piele who speaks Russian(!), and moved to the nice and windy anchorage nearby. A lot of the catamaran charters parked there among the cruisers. Sometimes, it gets loud at nights, and people are here from many many different countries.

The island itself is cute little town right close to the airport. To get the flight to Havana is not very easy here - we already waiting for 2 days for the empty seats. There is not many businesses in the town: there is a bank to exchange the money (dollar is not in favour here, the EU does considerably better); the hospital with ambulance, couple restaurants, gift shops with limited choices, a tiny grocery shop with grumpy cashier and very expansive, and a museum. I am so glad that we still have some groceries left for another week. Meanwhile, Kevin is trying to fix the engine, we hope that exchange of the defective injector will fix all our problems.