Back to Camaguey – again

Friday 19th February 2010

Rising from our bed at 4.30am we quietly showered, dressed and started to make our way out of the casa with a large rucksack on our backs and a smaller, but still heavy, rucksack on our fronts to find the door at the bottom of the stairs was bolted from the other side! Perhaps not the best omen, I unloaded the front bag and managed to manoeuvre my arm through the grating, and luckily managed to slide the bolt back. As I opened the front door a short alarm sounded but no-one appeared. As we opened the boot, I was really surprised to find that our car really was being watched by the person we were paying to watch it when he came over to find out who was fiddling with one of his charges! We have now got used to the ways of the car and we know our way out of this city and so we went our way.

We had to have the car back in Camagüey, 350km’s away, by 11.30am and although the roads are not great we made good time. After 3 hours we stopped at a ‘motorway’ café for breakfast and, with little time to spare, we placed our order quickly; the coffee arrived after about 10 minutes but it was a good 20 minutes, just as we were getting to the point of making a fuss, that the waiter came over to apologise for the delay, stating that they were waiting for fresh bread to arrive! The food arrived another 10 minutes after that; I would like to say it was waiting for, but it really wasn't, adding just a little more to the stress!

We finally pulled up outside the Cubacar office in Camagüey at about 11.10. We went in and asked for Adrian. We insisted that we would like the car checked back in and then we wanted to see the boss and make an official complaint. The man was very polite and efficient and told us that Adrian was on vacation (I think he meant day off) but he got out his phone and made a call. Obviously he spoke in Spanish, but the words I made out were the Spanish for ‘English’ and ‘boss’. He told us that Adrian was on his way and then we went and checked the car. With everything satisfactory we retrieved our luggage from the boot and were then confronted by the ‘parking attendant’ demanded a $1 cuc for looking after the car. We were both very ‘anti-Cuban’ at this point, we refused to pay saying to the car-hire guy ‘it’s your car – you pay it!’ He told us that the guy was charging for looking after our luggage but we never asked him to and I said ‘sue me’ and Paul said ‘take me to court’.

Within minutes Adrian was in the office. He put his hand out but we both refused to take it. First, we challenged him about the cost of hire. We had paid $70cuc a day; the contract read $65cuc! He immediately accepted responsibility and apologised; $70cuc was the cost of an automatic blablabla. Then we challenged him on the $5.5 overcharged on the gas; this time it took a little longer but he did, eventually, give us that back to! I still have to decide whether to make an official complaint – Paul has left that ball in my court, it’s not so much that he has any opinion, more that he can’t be bothered to do it himself!


There is not really much to do in Camaguey and what there is we have already done on previous visits. The Casa we had been shown to by one of the bicitaxi riders were not interested in helping us with finding out the times of the buses so we decided to go to the Cubatur office. The woman in there was something else entirely; I wish I could have taken her photo. She had a ‘heavy’ build with very dark skin and longish ‘afro’ hair and bright pink lipstick and a very loud voice. She had no wish to hide the fact that she didn’t have time to deal with us; she had had a very busy morning and had to get more stuff done before going onto her next office. ‘It’s my lunch’ she barked, ‘what you want, what is your question?’ We did try to get some information but she really didn’t want to know and I wasn’t about to be forced into making a snap decision just to suit her; so we left her to it.

The only way to find out was to go to the bus station. Someone had been hassling, almost following us around, ‘to take a romantic ride around the city’ so we got him to take us to the station to find out what we needed and then back to town instead. We found out the time of the bus but were told just to turn up about an hour before departure time.

One of the things we wanted to do in Cuba was to go to a concert at a ‘Casa de la Trova’ and knowing that Camaguey has a Casa de la Trova asked the rider to drop us off there. We found out that there was to be a concert that evening and that the entrance fee of $3 cuc per person included the first beverage. The doors opened at 9pm, music started at 10pm. The guy on the door invited us to come in and have a look around; with nothing else to do we not only went in but enjoyed a liquid lunch in the sunshine while listening to various musicians strumming, jamming and in one particular case, I am convinced, actually writing a piece of music. While we were in there we discussed our next move. The guide book mentions a small hotel on the beach in a very non tourist town called Caibarién. We would go to Santa Clara by bus tomorrow and stay one night then move onto Caibarién the next day. And so after two beers, and on a otherwise empty stomach, I made the phone calls to arrange our accommodation.

The music, Los Soneros de Camacho, started promptly at ten and was entertainingly traditional Cuban. Halfway through the 50 minutes set one of the older and original band members targeted us with an offer to purchase a CD; the picture on the cover was the same as one of the posters on display and Paul decided that he would have a copy at $10 cuc if he signed it for us. The live music stopped after 50 minutes and was replaced by piped music of the same ilk while the band packed up. The old guy who had sold us the CD came over to our table and indicated that he would like us to buy him a beer. I suppose we were a little affronted by this guys ‘front’ but bought him one anyway, even though we were not ready for a refill ourselves. He continued to attempt communication although, as I remember it there had been no thanks that I could make out and I’m not sure how I felt when he filled the plastic cup of a friend of his with beer that we had bought for him which his friend downed in one, but that was his choice and nice of him to be generous!

Moving to the piped music, as I do, I found myself being asked to dance by our new ‘companion’; at first I declined, but with Paul’s encouragement I got up and attempted to Salsa with the older pro which I didn’t enjoy at all and sat down again as soon as I could get away with. We still were not ready for a refill when he finished the first beer and started, well, asking for a second. Well, we both ignored this and then he got the message and left. You have to laugh; most Cubans are prepared to offer something for their ‘fee’ but some are so outrageously blatant that I just say ‘no’.

The next band started around quarter to midnight but we left shortly after that and headed for bed.