Cayo Coco (Cuba)
16th - 23rd October, 2010
The trip: Waterloo -> Toronto Pearson -> Cayo Coco -> Tryp Club Resort (Sunwing Vacations)
Usually I prefer to do a picture-log since it takes much less time. However, I feel compelled to write a more detailed travel-log of our trip to Cayo Coco, Cuba to share some interesting trivia and tips that would be useful to future travellers.
Weather: We went in October which is smack in the middle of hurricane season (September to November). Because of this our all-inclusive Sunwing vacation was a steal. We waited until almost the last day to make the reservation as Hurricane Paula had been threatening western Cuba. The first two days of our trip we experienced some strong winds and intermittent showers.
The weather during the entire period was hot and humid. However, most days it was at least partly cloudy. Whereas most people probably don't like the clouds, we love some cloud cover since we find that the direct sunlight and humidity makes for perfect heat stroke conditions.
Money: Some interesting trivia: Cubans use Pesos often called “normal pesos”. Since Cuba is NOT a member of the World Bank things get interesting for tourists. As Cuba has been aggressively advertising itself as a tourist destination (more on this later) it has developed a new currency for tourists to use: Convertible Pesos. The Cuban Government opened a Swiss bank account. Tourists convert their country’s currency into the convertible Pesos. The government puts the foreign funds into the Swiss account and uses them to “shop” in the world markets. Whats interesting is that the conversion rate is set by the Cuban Government. The days we were there 1 CDN was 0.88 CUC.
Another interesting piece of trivia: taking US dollars to Cuba is not advised. There appears to be an additional government tax on converting USD to CUC.
For the hotels in Cayo Coco I would suggest taking cash and not count on using credit cards. The hotels do not have ATMs and although they will accept a card for making payments they will not give you a cash advance. Some gas stations have small bank branches in them. A word of warning: cards from any bank that is connected to an American bank will not be accepted. The connection might be very remote and leave you wondering if its even true. Case in point: a Romanian friend’s Transalvania Bank’s credit card was rejected.
Although all the sockets in our room were round there was ONE flat-pin socket in the washroom. Through sheer genius thinking on my part (or stroke of luck) I had kept an extension cable. Hence I connected the extension cable in the washroom and lo- and behold we had three flat-pin sockets to use in the room :)
Tip: Check your hotels electricity supply and socket types before leaving. When in doubt take a transformer since most hotels do not have shops selling these traveller items.
Food: Do not go to Cuba expecting to be served gourmet meals. Most resorts are all-inclusive meaning food and drink is included. Perhaps this is one reason the food is not of the highest quality. Another reason could be that Cuba is not a rich country and hence the country does not have the resources to cater to the high culinary demands of the international traveller. That said, I had expected the worst when we set out to Cuba. The reviews had been discouraging when it came to food selection. We came back quite happy. Although I can only attest to the quality of food at Tryp Cayo Coco I am sure the other hotels are quite similar. The buffet (breakfast, lunch and dinner) had an ample variety. New dishes were offered almost every other day. Food was mostly hot and fresh (though some dishes clearly were recycled from the day before). One issue is that not all dishes are labeled (in fact only very few dishes are labeled) AND often the dishes are labeled incorrectly: once, what was labeled as fish was clearly a pork stew. There are also some prepared-on-demand counters. Breakfast included an egg station, a pancake station and an amazing fresh fruit smoothies station. For dinner there were pasta and grill stations (pork,chicken,beef, fish).
Drink: Since the resorts are all-inclusive (drink-till-you-pass-out) people go crazy with alcohol consumption. This was on a couple of occasions very irritating; one night we had a dinner reservation at a nice romantic a la carte restaurant. Unfortunately, the guests on the tables to the left and right of us knew each other and continued to shout across us in French. The flight back home was double annoying; the last day everyone made full use of the free drinks bar and a number of travellers were quite drunk and hence belligerent.
Cigars: No discussion of Cuba is complete without a mention of Cigars. Personally, I have never liked cigars; I simply cannot understand the concept of not inhaling and simply tasting. In any case I tried a couple of cigars and bought more than I should have (demanding friends). The most popular brands are Cohibas, Romeo and Juliets and Punch. There are countless other varieties.
We had a chance to visit a Cigar Factory. It was a sweat shop of sorts: rows of women sitting rolling up cigars. The tour guide told us “they have to make 140 cigars for their base pay and get a commission for anything over this amount”. The ladies making the cigars were very friendly; they even gave away free freshly rolled cigars to many of us in the group.
Below Left: Sunrise on our second day in Cuba.
Below Right: Storm rain, perhaps remnants of Hurricane Paula.
Electricity: This came as a surprise. A quick google search before leaving for Cuba revealed “electricity is 110V” and that the electric sockets are similar to those in Canada. Well, yes but with a twist. Many hotels choose to have 110 or 220V. For example, the Tryp Cayo Coco which we were staying in only had 220V and most sockets were the rounded British kind. These days most electronics are 110-240 compatible but there is always some exception (my wife’s hair-dryer and my Nikon’s quick charger).
Above: Our hotel room at Tryp Cayo Coco. Although the room was quite dated, it was kept in excellent shape. The view was astounding (even though we did not pay for an Ocean View we got a small chunk of the ocean anyways
Because I collect world currencies, I wanted to get hold of some Normal Pesos. Much as some people will have you believe it is not illegal for tourists to purchase and/or use regular pesos. However, some care is required. First, the conversion rate between CUP (normal pesos) and CUC (convertible pesos) VARIES from region to region. YES you heard me right. Even within the same country i.e. Cuba, the currencies have varying conversion rates. For example in Cayo Coco the rate is around 25 CUP to 1 CUC. However, I was told (by a local tour guide) that this rate can vary to as low as 4 CUP to 1 CUC. You ask why? Well here is the guide’s explanation:
Cubans are paid a combination of CUP and CUC. The amount of CUC they get is dependent on how “profitable” their company is i.e. more profitable more percentage of CUCs. Now the bigger cities have many profitable companies and hence pay their employees more CUC and therefore a CUC is not as “valuable” as in smaller towns and villages.
Left: The Cuban Convertible Peso: nothing but a piece of paper once you leave Cuba.
Right: The pesos that residents of Cuba use.
Trivia: The rum of choice for Cubans is not Havana Club as most would have you believe. Havana Club Rum is the most popular drink coming out of Cuba. An interesting tale is the history of Havana Club and Bacardi. Originally, Havana Club was produced only in Cuba. After the Cuban Revolution the company was nationalized. However, the original producers moved to the US and much later sold the rights of Havana Club to Bacardi. Now, the Rum is produced in Puerto Rico and called Havana Club Bacardi and Rum still produced in Cuba is referred to as the original Havana Club.
However, a number of cubans when asked told me that Cubans prefer Santiago as their rum of choice. The un-aged version is used in drinks like Mojitos, Cuba Libre and Ron Collins. Aged rum (7 years and up) is consumed straight.
Left: Fish n Chips (although the fish was a bit bland it was layered with some amazing sauce).
By far our favourite restaurant at Tryp Cayo Coco was the bar-style place on the beach (I forget its name). Apart from a small buffet of staples (rice, pasta, salad) they had a daily changing seafood menu for lunch. We ate lunch there 4 our of the 7 lunches that we had at the resort.
Above: Case in point. While doing my preliminary research on Cuba I was surprised by how many frequent travellers quoted: “Don’t forget your big travel mug :)”. I left it as some inside joke. Only once I got to our hotel did I realize what they meant: when you ask the bar for a drink they will give it to you in their small glass. If you have your own big travelling mug you can have that filled.
Left: Funny bartender who was always smiling and very helpful:)
Cigar prices vary depending on the size and brand. The Minis (almost cigarette like) are from 0.5 to 1 CUC. Then you get the Clubs which cost about a single Convertible Peso each. The real cigars are NOT cheap. I do not know the prices in Canada, so am unable to compare. However, a nice Cohiba is about 10 CUC, which is about 12 CDN.
One good thing about many products (cigars, rum) was that the prices hardly varied between the hotel shop, the small shop in a village and the airport duty free. Hence, my recommendation: buy all your cigars and alcohol at the duty free just before departure. This will allow you to carry it in your cabin luggage and not risk breaking your bottles.
Above: Stacked freshly made cigars perhaps for local consumption since the label did not ring a bell.
Below: Video clips of how cigars are produced.