Despite everything, the Caribbean's most impressive island offers one of the world's great travel experiences, from its music and culture to Havana and its other cities, as well as beaches and nature.

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In Cuba, Go West, to Pinar del Río & Viñales

  marcin jucha For visitors to Havana, one of the most popular day and overnights trips besides colonial wonder Trinidad is a visit to the far west of Cuba, the mostly rural province of Pinar del Río (whose locals, by the way, have over the years endured much teasing by other Cubans as guajiros – "country-bumpkin" peasants – though at least these days inaccurately, as far as I’ve been able to tell).  It’s home to not only the eponymous city – which makes for a charming visit in its own…

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Started by José Balido
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The colonial (and beachy) charms of Trinidad

When I started visiting one of Cuba’s earliest settlements (founded in 1514), down in the central south coast some five or so hours from Havana, in the late 1990s, Trinidad was a sleepy little colonial gem in the rough – as in, fairly shabby like most other Cuban towns, seemingly trapped in amber, even smaller feeling than its population of a little over 70,000. The colonial quarter was all about cobblestone streets lined with those retro old U.S. cars parked in front of low-slung,…

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Started by José Balido
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Welcome to Santiago de Cuba, the country's second city

When it comes to cities in Cuba, capital Havana does hog a disproportionate share of the attention – and it’s not hard to understand why. But at the southeastern tip of this island country, 540 miles (870 kilometres) from the capital, is another which amply deserves to be part of any visit to Cuba. One of the first of many settlements in the Americas to be named after mother country Spain’s revered pilgrimage city of Santiago de Compostela, the bayside port of Santiago de Cuba is this country’s…

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Started by Tripatini
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  • Anil March 9, 2011 at 10:34pm
    Wow - Now if only ordinary folks like us, with no family ties, no medical, academic or journalist credentials could go there legally.
  • David Paul Appell March 8, 2011 at 8:16pm
    Interesting news that the U.S. government has just authorized flights to Havana from 8 new airports: Atlanta, Baltimore, Chicago, Dallas/Fort Worth, Pittsburgh, San Juan, and Tampa. All this added capacity could be indicative that this new travel opening may surpass the one we saw during the Clinton years. 
  • GreenGlobalTravel.com March 1, 2011 at 5:01pm
    Our exclusive Q&A with Buena Vista Social Club founder Juan De Marco Gonzalez on the music of, and travel to, Cuba:  Afro-Cuban All-Stars.
  • David Paul Appell January 21, 2011 at 12:37am
    Donna, the comment was also made that service standards are not as high in Cuba as in the DR and other Caribbean islands, so that is also a factor counting against repeat visits. Of course, for me and for many others that's not a big factor, but it may be for folks who are just looking for a sunny tropical beach vacation.
  • Donna Esposito January 21, 2011 at 12:24am
    Living in Toronto, I know a few people who have vacationed in Cuba. They say it was more expensive than nearby islands like the Dominican Rep., so the Miami Herald may be right when they say that when the U.S.A. opens the door to Cuba the rest of the Carribean's travel business won't collapse.
  • David Paul Appell January 20, 2011 at 6:43pm
    Interesting piece in today's Miami Herald from astute Latin America (and especially Cuba) pundit Andrés Oppenheimer on how increased U.S. travel to the island may or may not affect the rest of the Caribbean.  Some say it will be a hard hit, others say not so much -- and may even grow the overall pie.  Yes, there will be novelty value and some pent-up demand, but on the other hand this is not exactly an unprecedented opening. And I can tell you first off that it's hardly going to be a flood, at least for the foreseeable future, at least in part because capacity is still pretty limited, and what capacity there is, is being amply used by Europeans, Latin Americans, and the other visitors Cuba already gets. So we'll see how big a move this actually turns out to be...
  • Lynn Rosen January 18, 2011 at 9:35am
    Thanks for the suggestion. Will follow up on that.
  • Anil January 18, 2011 at 1:01am
    Lynn: Do also contact your College and see if they have any immediate plans ? As an alum you can help organize tour to Cuba on behalf of the College :)
  • Lynn Rosen January 16, 2011 at 8:37am
    Thanks, Jose, for this document. Note it was revised in 2004 and, as you suggest, will likely change within the next while. Might a travel writer's organization apply for permission to travel to Cuba with a group under these new possible provsios?
  • José Balido January 16, 2011 at 5:20am

    You're right, Anil, journalists have always been exempt from restrictions on travel to Cuba, but if you read the Treasury Dep't. OFAC regulations on their Web site, it has to be a full-time journalist:


    "...journalism by journalists regularly employed in that capacity by a news reporting organization, including supporting broadcast or technical personnel..."

    Here are the current U.S. guidelines for travel to Cuba; this document will likely change in the next several weeks as these new changes are implemented.

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