La Habana Vieja

January 7, 2016

Tired today so we are all moving a little slow.  The good news is we have discovered the bus which, in addition to being free, allows you to hop on and off all day long.  At the bus stop we met a Canadian couple (Dan and Darlene) who like many others decided to come see Havana before "the change".  Darlene it turns out is a vegetarian who has been having a hard time finding good food to eat.  So... as I am sympathetic to fellow vegetarians we decided to invite them over for dinner this evening.  Our day started at the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes - Arte Cubano.

This is the courtyard at the Art Museum.  Although, I really enjoyed the museum the art was truly dark and depressing - no gay dancers here.  There were however many paintings of anguished, starving people. There was a particularly disturbing photo exhibition by Peter Turnley called The Human Condition.  Many, many photos of starving, sad and desperate refugees.  Of course, the whole idea was for you to be disturbed and we certainly were.  Job well done, Mr. Turnley.  Perhaps the photos were the breaking point for the rest of the crew - they now seemed to be on the verge of major depression. 

Sculpture at Art Museum -Christ being run thru with sickles.  Interesting commentary on the Revolution.

Time to move on.  From the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes we walked over to Plaza de la Catedral in the center of La Habana Vieja (Old Havana).  All of Old Havana is a Unesco World Heritage Site.  Catedral de San Cristobal was completed in 1787 and is one of the oldest cathedrals in the Americas.  The Catedral is made of coral taken from the ocean floor in the Gulf of Mexico.  A unique feature of this Catedral is the asymmetrical towers.  Apparently built asymmetrically as water would pool in the plaza after a hard rain, this configuration allowed the water to drain off back into the ocean.  At one time time the inside of the church was as ornate as the outside but in the 19th century it was "cleansed of excess ornamentation".  Someone obviously thought that was necessary.  Regardless of the "cleansing" it is still breathtakingly beautiful.  And after the sadness of the Cuban Art Museum church felt good.  Peaceful.  

Catedral de San Cristobal

Bell tower on the Catedral - bells are a mix of gold, silver and bronze (for a sweeter tone)

Lots of windows for natural light

Sun peeking in thru stained glass window

There were tombs of Cardinals next to this alter - buried inside the Church

Beautiful with all the gold and marble

Next to the church is a little restaurant "El Patio" so we decided to stop and have some lunch.  This view is down a typical narrow brick street - it is next to the Catedral.  

View from El Patio

The weather was perfect and the company and food were great.  Another perfect day in Havana.  

Santeria ladies

These ladies are of the Santeria religion - an Afro-Cuban religion that grew out of the slave trade.  There is some mixing of Santeria and Catholicism.  Not sure what they were doing here outside of our little restaurant. 

Musicians playing for the diners -notice how the buildings in the background have been restored

After lunch we headed to the Plaza de Armas and the Castillo de la Real Fuerza.  The fort sits on the western side of Havana Harbor and is the oldest stone fort in the Americas dating back to 1558!  It is complete with drawbridge and moat.  Built by slaves and prisoners it ended up not being a useful fort (too small and poorly positioned) so it became the residence of the Governor of Havana.

Plaza de Armas

Castillo de la Real Fuerza

A Moat - How cool is that?

Michael, Roger and the Cuban lady working at the fort

View of Havana from the top of the Fort

After touring the amazing fort we were too tired to walk back to the bus stop so we hailed a taxi for a ride back to Marina Hemingway.  Our new Canadian friends came for dinner and we had a great evening discussing all things Canadian and American.  Amazing the misperceptions that exist between the two countries.  Tomorrow we have scheduled a day of rest!